UNLV Law Magazine 2020

VIRTUAL REALITY: AS LAW AND TECHNOLOGY COLLIDE LIKE NEVER BEFORE, STUDENTS PREPARE TO ZOOM INTO THE FUTURE

A HELPING HAND: UNIVERSITY LEGAL SERVICES PROJECT OFFERS FREE IMMIGRATION ASSISTANCE TO STUDENTS, STAFF, FAMILIES

UNLV Law THE MAGAZINE OF THE WILLIAM S. BOYD SCHOOL OF LAW | 2020

ANSWERING THE CALL

The Boyd School of Law responds to the nationwide call for social justice reform with innovative initiatives and a renewed commitment to making a difference

WILLIAM S. BOYD SCHOOL OF LAW

LL.M. in Gaming Law and Regulation “I had been laid off during the last recession and spent 10 years bouncing between contract positions. I decided that I needed something to separate myself from other job applicants.

The faculty are all highly accomplished and recognizable figures in gaming who clearly enjoy sharing their experiences. After graduation I secured a job with the New Hampshire Lottery as their first Director of Sports Betting. The LL.M. was a truly immersive experience into a growing industry, and I can’t thank everyone involved enough for where I am today.”

Daniel Maloney (LL.M., 2020) Director of Sports Betting, New Hampshire Lottery

Flexible Schedules: Available on a part-time or full-time basis with earlymorning classes and one-week intensives.

The UNLV Alumni Advantage: JD Alumni from UNLV can transfer up to 9 units of UNLV gaming coursework toward the 24-unit LL.M. program.

Gain Practical Experience: Students will have access to top gaming organizations through the externship program.

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CONTENTS Features

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LEADING THE MARCH FOR CHANGE

As the nation clamors for substantive social justice reform, the Boyd School of Law is advancing the cause through creative and impactful courses, programs, and community initiatives.

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ZOOMING INTO THE FUTURE

Through preparation and innovation, the Boyd School of Law community overcame pandemic-induced challenges and put graduates in position to succeed upon entering the legal profession’s new virtual reality.

Departments

2 FROM THE DEAN’S DESK 4 OPENING ARGUMENT 6 CENTERS & CLINICS 10 GIVING BACK 14 WHO KNEW? 30 FACULTY FOCUS 35 THE GALLERY 38 CLASS ACTIONS 42 DONORS 2020 | UNLV Law

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A MESSAGE FROM DEAN DANIEL W. HAMILTON

FROM THE DEAN’S DESK

Answering the Call

T

o say this has been a year unlike any other is not hyperbole—2020 has brought us all varying levels of pain and hardship. But of the many responsibilities of a public law school, one of the most crucial is having the wherewithal to meet challenges head-on and react accordingly so that the institution can continue to realize its mission. In the case of the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law, that means providing students with an excellent legal education, encouraging our faculty in their important scholarship, supporting our alumni, and serving our community.

I’m honored to say that through all the obstacles we had to navigate this year, everyone associated with the Boyd School of Law worked tirelessly to ensure we stayed true to our mission. It started in March when the COVID-19 pandemic penetrated Nevada’s borders and forced us to immediately shift from in-person to virtual learning. The speed and cooperation required to accomplish this monumental task reflected our faculty’s determination and the great goodwill of our students and community.

Our devoted faculty then spent the summer pivoting to an entirely virtual environment (see Page 32). The goal was straightforward: Provide students with a first-rate academic experience online. In the end, a process that easily could have taken years to complete was telescoped into a matter of months.

Our hope (and plan) is to return to inperson instruction as soon as it’s safe to do so. But there was one silver lining we discovered during this difficult experience: We now know that combining these two methods of instruction—online and in-person—can enhance the learning experience. And that’s critical, because this forced move to online instruction has profoundly altered American legal education.

What the future holds remains to be seen, but know with certainty that we’re capable of providing an excellent online education.

After settling into our “new normal,” we even began to appreciate the many advantages of online learning, which is vital at a time when the professional legal community has begun to embrace the oppor2

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tunities of technology. Moving to virtual instruction has allowed for innovation and the utilization of technology that actually can enhance the learning experience, while also allowing for speakers from around the country to take part in our events without having to travel to campus. At the center of that innovation has been Boyd Law School Professor Joe Regalia, one of the nation’s leading authorities on law and technology.

Over the summer, we seized upon Joe’s expertise to present an online boot camp designed to make sure our students and graduates were well positioned to succeed in the job market (see Page 26).

Not only did we swiftly and successfully shift gears to address our students’ academic and career needs, but our commitment to the community never wavered in the face of the pandemic. Our Thomas and Mack clinics, our annual Community Law Day, and our free legal education classes presented in partnership with the Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada all proceeded without missing a beat. Our students also stepped up to the plate in a major way, as a record number (more than 50) participated in the Legal Aid Center’s Partners in

Pro Bono program (see Page 10).

The societal challenges we faced were not, of course, limited to COVID-19. Following the senseless deaths of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd—and many others—we witnessed protests that stretched from coast to coast. The message delivered was loud and clear: To work to put an end to systemic racial inequality, we must enact meaningful social and criminal justice reform.

From our curriculum to our programming to our community outreach, equality and diversity have been ingrained in the DNA of Nevada’s only law school since its inception 22 years ago. Yet we fully recognize we can and must do more, just as we recognize it’s paramount that we’re part of the solution (see Page 20).

At Boyd, we are fortunate to have access to some of the foremost legal scholars on issues of race and inequality, including Professors Frank Rudy Cooper, Addie Rolnick, and Stewart Chang. Together, this trio oversees the Race, Gender & Policing program, which launched in spring 2019.

This year, in response to the protests staged worldwide—and in anticipation of future reforms—we created a new course

FROM THE DEAN’S DESK

UNLV LAW MAGAZINE EDITOR MATT JACOB ASSOCIATE EDITOR MICHAEL BERTETTO GRAPHIC DESIGNER CHED WHITNEY COPY EDITOR PAUL SZYDELKO CONTRIBUTING WRITERS STEVE BORNFELD PATRICK EVERSON LISA JACOB PAUL SZYDELKO

Our hope (and plan) is to return to in-person instruction as soon as it’s safe to do so. But there was one silver lining we discovered during this difficult experience: We now know that combining these two methods of instruction—online and in-person—can enhance the learning experience.

titled “Law and Inequality: Policing, Protest, and Reform.”

Taught by Cooper, Chang, Rolnick, and fellow Professor Eve Hanan, this course is required for all 1L Boyd Law students.

This past year also saw the launch of both the Justice Michael L. Douglas PreLaw Fellowship Program and the “Senator Harry Reid Civic Dialogue Program” presented by retired U.S. Senator and Boyd Law School Distinguished Fellow Harry Reid. The former, which is led by the distinguished retired Nevada Supreme Court Justice, encourages Nevada’s high school and undergraduate students from underserved backgrounds to consider pursuing (and preparing for) a legal education. We are delighted to welcome our first cohort for a virtual course January 11-15.

Beyond these programs, the law school continues to work in partnership with Clark County School District students on such initiatives as the Voting Rights Project and Students United for Diversity. Also, former Governor Brian Sandoval—Nevada’s first Hispanic governor and a Boyd Law School Distinguished Fellow—created our Law and Leadership program, which staged special events and courses that highlighted how our students could positively influence their community through positions in government and public service.

The program is still going strong even as Sandoval assumes his new role as president of the University of Nevada, Reno.

While I’m confident each of these initiatives will have

a lasting impact, I also recognize there’s still much work to be done. And Nevada’s law school stands ready and willing to do that work by adding more voices, more perspectives, and more ideas. Diversity and inclusion are more than just buzzwords; they’re at the heart of who we are and what we believe in.

Recently we celebrated our December graduation at the law school. It was inspiring to hear about all the public interest work our graduates have already accomplished, including representing Nevadans in court, working on public policy initiatives to protect the environment, and partnering with the legal community on pro bono cases. These graduates join more than 2,500 Boyd Nation alumni, and we cannot wait to see what they will accomplish.

Our students and alumni serve as a constant reminder that even in difficult times, the Boyd School of Law remains committed to its public mission.

These recent graduates and the thousands who preceded them show that we will always meet this commitment.

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS JOSHUA HAWKINS CONNIE PALEN LONNIE TIMMONS III UNLV PRESIDENT KEITH E. WHITFIELD PROVOST & EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT CHRIS HEAVEY DEAN, WILLIAM S. BOYD SCHOOL OF LAW DANIEL W. HAMILTON SUBSCRIBER UPDATES Update your address and submit Class Actions items at: law.unlv.edu/alumni/ StayConnected READER FEEDBACK UNLV Law magazine welcomes feedback. Submit comments at: law.unlv.edu/magazine UNLV Law magazine is published by the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law, Office of Communications 4505 S. Maryland Parkway, Box 451003, Las Vegas, Nevada 89154-1003 (702) 895-3671 law.unlv.edu UNLV is an AA/EEO INSTITUTION

Daniel W. Hamilton Dean and Richard J. Morgan Professor of Law 2020 | UNLV Law

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PROMINENT MEMBERS OF NEVADA’S LEGAL COMMUNITY PRESENTS A COMPELLING CASE

OPENING ARGUMENT

AARON FORD ATTORNEY GENERAL, STATE OF NEVADA

Hands on the Present, Eyes Toward the Future ACHIEVING MEANINGFUL SOCIAL AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORM REQUIRES A LOT OF TALK—AND EVEN MORE ACTION

M

y path to becoming your attorney general has been a long one, paved with many challenges. My family didn’t have much when I was growing up—we couldn’t even afford my college application fee.

But with a lot of family support and help from the federally funded Upward Bound program, I managed not only to attend college, but to earn five degrees (including a J.D. from The Ohio State University). I also have served this wonderful state in two substantial capacities: first as a member of the Nevada State Senate, and now as your attorney general.

All of my experiences—personal, educational, and professional—prepared me for the responsibilities I face today. And those responsibilities are as significant as they are vast.

It’s no secret our communities are confronting a variety of challenges, many of which flow through the criminal justice system. Just one problem with that approach: Punishing the outcome doesn’t address or solve the underlying problem. Criminalizing a large portion of the population often results in collateral consequences, and those effects often produce and perpetuate unnecessary roadblocks for nonviolent offenders and recovering addicts who might otherwise live more productively through stable employment, home ownership, and community and family engagement.

While retribution is one of the purposes of the criminal justice system, so is rehabilitation, which includes creating opportunities for individuals to focus on re-entry into their communities. In pursuit of that objective, I’ve been a member of the Advisory Commission for the Administration 4

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of Justice since I was a state senator. The commission drafted a report that identified key considerations as we continue tirelessly fighting for justice in Nevada. For instance, our state’s prison population has grown seven percent since 2009, and the number of people with an identified mental health need who have been imprisoned has increased 35 percent since 2008.

In response to this disturbing criminal justice data, I have been working to implement the changes mandated in 2019 by Nevada Assembly Bill 236.

Policies I’ve enacted include court recommendations against pretrial practices that have a disparate impact on low-income individuals. We also have promoted alternatives to incarceration to limit the aforementioned collateral consequences while addressing public safety. These alternatives can include house arrest, added supervision through diversion, and other specialty court programs. Additionally, we have instituted policies and training to combat implicit biases in decision-making to guard against disparate treatment of various groups of people.

Of course, any discussions about meaningful criminal justice reform in Nevada must include a commitment to improve mental health resources. Lack of affordable mental health services is a crisis in the Silver State, where several counties lack even a single licensed psychiatrist. In those communities, individuals who require a psychiatric evaluation to determine if they’re a danger to themselves or others must be transported—sometimes hundreds of miles—to another community that has a psychiatrist.

Make no mistake: Accessibility to health services and mental health treatment makes all Nevada communities safer. There is no

justice without human dignity, fairness, and equity. That is why incarceration should not be our first step in addressing mental health issues.

Running concurrently with the need for modifications to our criminal justice system has been the call for social justice reform.

As all of us have witnessed through the many ongoing protests across our country, Americans not only are taking notice of institutional injustices, but they’re demanding change. Now is the time to have these difficult conversations about a number of critical topics, including: the roles of law enforcement in our communities; overincarceration; use-of-force responses; and criminalizing homelessness.

These conversations (among many others) are vital if we are to ever achieve substantial and overarching criminal justice reform.

The day I took the oath of office as your attorney general in 2019 is burned into my memory. It was with intense conviction that I raised my right hand, placed my left on my father-in-law’s Bible, and made a commitment to myself and to every Nevada citizen to serve and protect this great state. In that moment, I was fully cognizant that each of my decisions has the potential to impact all Nevadans. Such is the way I lead: with my hands on the present and my eyes toward the future.

Without question, 2020 has been a difficult year for everyone, and we’ve all struggled in different ways. That’s why it’s important that we, as compassionate humans, must acknowledge those who might be suffering and also recognize our role in our local and global communities.

Remember: We all have a part to play in bringing about change. When we stand tall and stand together, our communities become stronger.

Americans not only are taking notice of institutional injustices, but they’re demanding change. And now is the time to have difficult conversations about a number of critical topics.

2020 | UNLV Law

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CENTERS & CLINICS

SALTMAN CENTER

The Psychology of Technology NEW ARTICLE CO-AUTHORED

BY BOYD PROFESSOR JEAN STERNLIGHT WILL EXPLORE THE ROLE PSYCHOLOGY PLAYS IN LAW’S INCREASINGLY HIGH-TECH WORLD

BY MATT JACOB It’s not exactly a classified secret that those who practice and teach law generally aren’t big fans of change. Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and the legal community was forced to embrace something many in the profession had long resisted: technology.

“Law has always been a pretty conservative profession—not conservative politically but rather slow to change,” says Jean Sternlight, the founding director of the Saltman Center for Conflict Resolution and Michael and Sonja Saltman Professor of Law at the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law. “So while new technology obviously is being created at a rapid pace and has dramatically changed a lot of other professions, the law has been lagging. But what happened with COVID is the legal system got a major kick in the pants when it comes to technology.”

Whether through videoconferencing, teleconferencing, or other modes of modern communication, technology has indeed kept the legal wheels spinning during the pandemic, first when much of the nation was adhering to stay-at-home orders and now when social distancing protocols remain in effect. But while many lawyers, judges, and alternative dispute resolution (ADR) neutrals have come to appreciate— and even enjoy—the conveniences of technology, there’s still much to learn about the impact it can have on legal outcomes.

That’s where Sternlight comes in. With University of Illinois College of Law professor Jennifer Robbennolt, Sternlight is coauthoring an article titled “High-Tech Dispute Resolution: Lessons from Psychology for a Post-COVID-19 Era.” The article ex6

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amines two key issues: why and how the legal profession should consider psychology when deciding when to deploy technology (and when not to), and how psychology can determine which components work best in given situations.

“Courts, lawyers, private ADR providers, neutrals, and disputants themselves—all of those groups have to make choices: What dispute resolution process will work best for their dispute, and how should they tailor that process to be most appropriate for their needs,” Sternlight says. “This has been true forever, but as we have more and more options with dispute resolution processes— we’re now considering all kinds of technical variations on litigation, mediation, arbitration, and negotiation—those choices become more complicated. So there’s an awful lot that these groups should be considering. … Focusing on some of the background psychology could really help everyone involved in a given case make good decisions on behalf of their disputants and on behalf of the public.”

This isn’t the first time Sternlight and Robbennolt have studied the impact of psychology on the legal industry. They coauthored the book Psychology for Lawyers: Understanding the Human Factors in Negotiation, Litigation and Decision Making in 2013.

The book explored aspects of cognitive and social psychology and considered how it could be useful to litigators in their daily tasks, such as interviewing and counseling clients, negotiating, and drafting documents. “This article is really an outgrowth of that same line of thinking, but now applying psychology specifically to the issues of dispute system design,” Sternlight says.

Just as teachers have had to adapt the way in which they structure a lecture for students attending classes online rather than in person, Sternlight notes that participants involved in dispute resolution must do the same when they meet virtually. Of particular importance is considering how technology might influence a multitude of psychological factors, including fatigue, empathy, perception, and credibility.

Take, for example, the latter: Is a person more believable (or not) when they write something online, when they make an inperson statement in a mediation, when they testify as a witness in a courtroom, or when they speak via videoconference?

“People are more likely to lie when they’re in a more anonymous setting—that distinction really does exist,” Sternlight says. “Also, we tend to believe people more when we’re physically closer to them. Another significant issue is rapport. It seems,

SALTMAN CENTER

CENTERS & CLINICS

“Of particular importance is considering how technology might influence a multitude of psychological factors, including fatigue, empathy, perception, and credibility.

“For instance, people are more likely to lie in a more anonymous setting—that distinction really does exist.” and preliminary studies show, that it’s harder—but not impossible—to create good rapport in a videoconference [versus] in person. It’s different when you’re only looking at their face.”

Sternlight says the goal of her and Robbennolt’s article isn’t to persuade the legal community to abandon traditional means of dispute resolution and shift entirely to a high-tech way of doing business (or vice versa). Rather, they hope their research sheds a brighter light on the ways in which

psychology and technology intertwine within the legal system.

“Psychologists have done a lot of work analyzing various communication approaches and how those approaches impact issues that are relevant to dispute resolutions,” Sternlight says. “Our article expands on that work with the hope that those in the legal community will use the information gleaned from our research to help decide which communication process they want to use and how best to structure it.”

Jean Sternlight Michael and Sonja Saltman Professor of Law; founding director, Saltman Center for Conflict Resolution

2020 | UNLV Law

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CENTERS & CLINICS

IMMIGRATION CLINIG

Dream Works IMMIGRATION CLINIC PROGRAM OFFERS CRITICAL—AND FREE— IMMIGRATION-RELATED LEGAL ASSISTANCE TO UNLV AND COLLEGE OF SOUTHERN NEVADA STUDENTS, STAFF, AND FAMILY MEMBERS

BY STEVE BORNFELD Charity needn’t begin at home. Yet when it is directed toward those closest to us, it’s gratifying that charity can untangle the complexities of legalities—for those who need it most.

“Recently, we had a relative of a CSN [College of Southern Nevada] employee who had been detained by ICE [U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement] since March,” says Michael Shamoon, himself an immigrant from Iraq who runs the Immigration Clinic’s University Legal Services project at the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law, from which he graduated in 2019.

“With COVID-19 spreading, there was an increased risk of him getting sick,” Shamoon says. “We had the hearing in August, and he won the right to stay in the United States and was finally released after six long months.

It was so moving to see. His mother cried when she found out he was coming home.”

Home—defined here as the campuses of the extended higher-education family of UNLV and CSN—is where the heart of legal representation is. That’s thanks to the University Legal Services project, which is devoted entirely to offering free legal assistance to immigrant students, staff, and family members of both institutions.

“It gives me great satisfaction knowing that individuals who otherwise wouldn’t have an attorney can now get the representation they need because the system is so difficult to understand,” says Shamoon, who handles all University Legal Services cases himself, with occasional research help from students who work at the Immigration Clinic.

“Immigration law is very complex and constantly changing,” he says. “The government maintains that any individual can navigate the process without an attorney— 8

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that an attorney isn’t necessary to file an application to obtain an immigration benefit—but that simply isn’t true. The forms, documentation, and evidence required for these applications are sometimes so overwhelming for the average person with no legal background that they are bound to make some kind of mistake. And that mistake can result in something very final, like being deported.”

Boyd Law School alumna Mayra SalinasMenjivar, a former Immigration Clinic fellow (and El Salvadoran immigrant), created the University Legal Services project as a pilot program in July 2018. After SalinasMenjivar moved on to private practice, Shamoon—also an Immigration Clinic fellow—took over the program in November 2019. Under his leadership, the program’s umbrella was expanded to cover CSN. “With about one in five Nevada residents being foreign-born, the need for legal services from our growing immigrant population has increased exponentially,” Governor Steve Sisolak said in a statement. “I am pleased to see Nevada’s renowned law school, the William S. Boyd School of Law … is addressing these needs by delivering free legal assistance to students, staff, and families [of UNLV and CSN] to ensure immigrants can take full advantage of the services and protections afforded to them. When immigrants succeed, Nevada succeeds.”

Grants from both UNLV and CSN fund the project, which offers an array of legal services, including: • Helping undocumented individuals obtain legal status • Assisting U.S. citizens trying to sponsor a relative to come to America • Helping legal residents apply for U.S. citizenship • Defending families threatened with separation through deportation • Facilitating Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) paperwork.

“The Immigration Clinic serves the community at-large. Because of limited resources, its service is basically limited to deportation defense. But the University Legal Services program functions much more like a normal immigration law firm,” says Shamoon, who estimates that 10 percent of

Michael Shamoon, Boyd Law School alum and director of the University Legal Services project UNLV’s student population is undocumented. “Anything regarding immigration that someone comes into the clinic with—if they qualify for my program, we take their case.”

Since he took over the program, Shamoon has assisted more than 150 clients. Most common, he says, are cases in which undocumented immigrants or those here on visa are attempting to obtain a green card (i.e., an “adjustment of status”) to remain here legally. “I see the joy on a mother’s face when she finds out she can finally get a green card after having waited 20 years, after living in the shadows, always looking over her shoulder to make sure she isn’t caught by law enforcement,” he says. “These immigrants come to this country for opportunities, to give their children better lives.”

With immigration issues ratcheting up during the Trump administration, the need for legal services pertaining to DACA renewals for students colloquially known as “Dreamers” has increased substantially.

This became particularly important after the federal government not only terminated new DACA applications but required re-

IMMIGRATION CLINIC

newals for existing Dreamers to be submitted every year, rather than every two years, thus doubling the application fee.

“That was one of the things that really got the support of the UNLV community and [stimulated] funding for this program, because Dreamers are part of the fabric of our community,” Shamoon says. “The government’s new [DACA] policy opened a lot of people’s eyes to the impact this administration was having on immigration. People could not stand for that because these are our neighbors, our friends, the people with whom we share our community. They are us. They are Americans.”

Another vital issue Shamoon addresses through the University Legal Services program: petitioning on behalf of clients who are trying to bring their deported parents back to America. Recently, he took on the case of a 21-year-old student whose parents were forced to return to Mexico when she

CENTERS & CLINICS

“It gives me satisfaction knowing that individuals who otherwise wouldn’t have an attorney can get the representation they need, because the system is so difficult to understand.”

Michael Shamoon, 2019 Boyd Law graduate and University Legal Services director

was only 6, leaving her to grow up without them. “What kind of society allows children to be without parents—orphaned by the immigration system?” Shamoon says. “It’s something that needs to change.”

And he’s more than happy to help inspire

that change through the University Legal Services project.

“I’m thorough in my work, so I know my client will get the kind of representation that is as good or better than if they hired an attorney who charged them a fee they couldn’t afford—we’re talking more than $10,000 in some cases. That’s why this is such an important and valuable resource for all students, staff, and their families.”

FOR MORE INFORMATION Call us or visit our website to complete a simple evaluation on the University Legal Services project form to make an appointment. Services are available to those who qualify and as resources allow. ›› (702) 895-2080 or visit Law.UNLV.edu/ Immigration

2020 | UNLV Law

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A GLIMPSE INTO BOYD’S GOOD WORKS IN THE COMMUNITY

GIVING BACK

How Can We Help?

“The success of this program, among several other initiatives, validates our decision to include community service among our founding principles.

That includes requiring all students to do pro bono work.”

AT A TIME OF GREAT NEED, THE COMMUNITY-FOCUSED PARTNERS IN PRO BONO PROGRAM ATTRACTS RECORD NUMBER OF BOYD LAW SCHOOL STUDENTS

BY LISA JACOB More than 20 years after the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law opened its doors, one of its core missions remains unchanged: Serve the community. And as hundreds of thousands of Southern Nevadans face increased economic hardship as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, Boyd Law School students are heeding the call to serve like never before.

This year, a record number of students— more than 50—have volunteered to participate in Partners in Pro Bono, a collaboration between UNLV and the Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada (LACSN) Pro Bono Project. The program pairs students with attorneys to represent low-income individuals and families who face critical legal issues but cannot afford representation.

Christine Smith—the school’s associate dean for public service, compliance, and administration—established Boyd’s partnership with the Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada when the law school was founded in 1998. The Partners in Pro Bono program started two years later with a two-pronged objective: fill a community need and provide students with the kind of practical, day-to-day, real-world experience they cannot learn in a classroom. But that real-world experience is much more than learning how to draft motions and summary judgments.

“They learn about access to justice, and that there is a huge population in Nevada that needs that access and isn’t able to get it,” Smith says. “The success of this program, among several other initiatives, validates our decision to include community service among our founding principles. That includes requiring all students to do pro bono work.”

That work covers a wide swath of law, including bankruptcy, consumer fraud, landlord-tenant disputes, divorce, and immigration. However, the largest need by far involves 10

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Christine Smith Boyd Law School associate dean

family law and cases of abuse or neglect.

Initially designed to span one semester, the pairings were lengthened to a year to give students the opportunity to see cases through to a conclusion and possibly take on a second case. Along the way, those students gain valuable early-career experience, as well as an appreciation for how pro bono work tangibly (and positively) impacts the community.

Preparing to start her second case in the program, 3L Boyd Law student Alisa A. McAffee can attest to the benefits of participating in Partners in Pro Bono.

“Last year, I handled everything from setting up the initial client interview to writing legal documents to arguing on behalf of my client at my first hearing,” McAffee says about the Nevada Gaming Control Board appeals case that enabled her client to continue working in the gaming industry. “My mentor guided me through each step and helped me learn what to look out for and how to be effective. This hands-on approach is one of the most practical and rewarding experiences I have had in law school.”

During the process, McAffee was paired

with attorney Dayvid Figler, whose guidance, she says, was crucial to understanding “so many things beyond the law.”

Based in Southern Nevada, Figler is a nationally recognized expert on problem gambling, a former municipal court judge, and a prolific criminal defense attorney. He also has steadily contributed to the law school’s programming since its inception through a range of activities, including presenting guest lectures, leading panels on topics such as the recent Nevada Supreme Court criminal settlement rules panel, advising the Pop-Up Protest Clinic, and providing internships and employment with his firm.

“He helped me understand what the adjudicator would be looking for, how to craft my argument, what facts would be helpful to point out and why, and how to prepare my client regarding the process,” McAffee says.

“After the case concluded, he also shared with me things that he learned during the project.

This sort of one-on-one interaction with a bar-appointed attorney is so helpful because it gives students knowledge and confidence about entering the legal profession.”

Noah Malgeri, director of the Legal

GIVING BACK

Aid Center’s Pro Bono Project, estimates 750,000 Southern Nevada residents qualify for free legal services. Working in tandem with Smith, he pairs students with attorneys who have agreed to take on pro bono cases through the Legal Aid Center. Although most cases lack the excitement reflected in TV courtroom dramas, the students recognize the importance of their work and its real-life implications.

“These aren’t necessarily glamorous situations, and the work that it leads to is not necessarily lucrative,” Malgeri says. “But they want to do it, they have a passion for it.

These kids have a real passion for justice.”

That passion was particularly evident in the record number of students who committed to the program this past year during the community’s greatest hour of need. To Malgeri, that simply affirms the Boyd School of Law’s commitment to admit not only the brightest students, but those

whose compassion is as impressive as their intellect.

“The UNLV Boyd School of Law really does attract some of the finest attorneys-intraining in the country in terms of the quality of their character—they come for the right reason,” he says. “The fact so many students want to get involved to help people in our community, our neighbors who can’t afford an attorney, is really amazing. It speaks volumes about the character and the maturity of the student body at Boyd.”

Which is precisely why Figler encourages his colleagues to jump on board as Partners in Pro Bono mentors.

“I’d encourage any lawyers in the community to really look into the program, even if the real-life case scenarios are outside their normal practice areas,” Figler says. “With the combined energy and collective brainpower of the lawyer and student, and the support of the Legal Aid Center behind you, there’s very little that is inaccessible, while the need in the community has never been greater.

“This is a wonderfully thoughtful program designed to funnel the best we have to offer to those who need it the most. I encourage every lawyer to take a chance.”

HOW TO GET INVOLVED To volunteer to take a pro bono case and mentor a Boyd student, contact Cincy Morales Kerben ›› (702) 386-1413 or CKerben@LACSN.org 2020 | UNLV Law

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A GLIMPSE INTO BOYD’S GOOD WORKS IN THE COMMUNITY

GIVING BACK

From the Past, for the Future IN THE NAME OF TWO PIONEERING NEVADANS, BOYD LAW SCHOOL DEAN DANIEL HAMILTON ESTABLISHES SCHOLARSHIPS DESIGNED TO SUPPORT LOCAL STUDENTS FROM UNDERSERVED POPULATIONS

Ruby Duncan scholarship winner Jazmine Thompson

BY MATT JACOB Most Nevadans of a younger generation— including students attending the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law—likely are unfamiliar with the names Judge Addeliar Guy and Ruby Duncan. That’s about to change, thanks to a recent $125,000 donation from Boyd Law School Dean and Richard J. Morgan Professor of Law Daniel W. Hamilton. Funds from that gift created two new scholarships that honor Guy and Duncan, two trailblazing Nevadans whose separate paths intersected at the same goal: improve the lives of underserved citizens and show them—through words and actions—that a more just future was possible.

The inaugural recipients of these scholarships—which will be awarded each fall to two students who meet a strict set of criteria—are 3L students Uzoma Mbelu (Judge Addeliar Guy scholarship) and Jazmine Thompson (Ruby Duncan scholarship).

“While the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law continues to provide its students with one of the most affordable legal educations in the nation, I’m keenly aware that attending law school is expensive. And Boyd is committed to doing all it can to keep the law school accessible and affordable,” Hamilton says. “As the school’s Dean, I wanted to do my part to create opportunities for first-generation students to attend Nevada’s law school.

“Having learned in recent years about the immense accomplishments of Ruby Duncan, a legendary activist for Nevada welfare rights and labor reform, and the late Judge Addeliar Dell Guy who was, among other things, Nevada’s first black district judge, it’s an honor to establish these scholarships in their names. It’s important not only to recognize them but to inform our students about 12

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the contributions these pioneers made to this community.”

Duncan moved to Las Vegas in 1952 at age 20 and began working as a waitress, making low wages that required her to supplement her income through welfare to support a family that would grow to include seven children. She eventually found higher paying jobs as a maid and kitchen worker at various hotels on the Las Vegas Strip until suffering a job-related injury at the Sahara Hotel that left her unable to work for a year.

Forced to return to government assistance, Duncan was shocked at the small welfare stipend she received. So in the late 1960s, she led the Welfare Rights Movement in Las Vegas, eventually helping to produce significant welfare reform that improved the economic standing of impoverished citizens throughout Nevada.

Then in 1971, the Duncan-led Nevada Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO) was joined by other activists (including actress Jane Fonda) for a march on the Las Vegas Strip in protest of poor working conditions.

It was an issue about which Duncan had first-hand knowledge: While employed at the Flamingo Hotel, she led a walkout of the

property’s maids, hoping the demonstration would prompt management to take seriously the concerns of the housekeeping staff. Instead, Duncan was fired the next day.

A year later, the NWRO transformed into the nonprofit, anti-poverty organization Operation Life. Under Duncan’s stewardship for 20 years, Operation Life supported and uplifted countless underprivileged Southern Nevadans through job programs, drug and violence intervention programs, a children’s medical clinic, and the creation of the first library on the Westside, a predominantly African American community.

At the same time Duncan was working to effect social change for the less fortunate, Guy was making history on the legal scene.

After a chance encounter with Clark County District Attorney Ted Marshall at a national convention in Las Vegas in 1964, Guy received an offer he couldn’t refuse: leave his native Chicago, move to the desert, and join Marshall’s office. Upon passing the Nevada Bar, Guy became the state’s first practicing Black attorney. Other milestones soon followed. He became the first African American in Clark County to become deputy district attorney, then chief district at-

GIVING BACK

Judge Addeliar Guy scholarship winner Uzoma Mbelu

“Having learned in recent years about the immense accomplishments of Ruby Duncan, a legendary activist for Nevada welfare rights and labor reform, and the late Judge Addeliar Dell Guy who was, among other things, Nevada’s first black district judge, it’s an honor to establish these scholarships in their names.”

Dan Hamilton Dean, UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law

torney and, in 1975, the state’s first African American district judge, appointed by Governor Mike O’Callaghan to the Eighth Judicial District Court.

Guy remained on the same bench for more than two decades, earning a sterling reputation for his impartiality and integrity as well as his willingness to serve as a role model. He even was known to use his judicial pulpit to impart life wisdom to those in his courtroom, be they offenders or observers. For instance, following a first-degree murder conviction, Guy delivered a lengthy soliloquy about the societal problems that youngsters encounter. “I’m planting seeds,” he said at the time, “because you never know how somebody might use it five, 10, 20, 30, 40 years from now.”

“Judge Guy was a trailblazer,” former District Judge Stephen Huffaker told the Las Vegas Sun following Guy’s death in 1997. “He was the Jackie Robinson of the judiciary.”

Now, both Guy and Duncan are recognized through scholarships designed to give opportunities to local students who have a passion for law and for uplifting others whose socioeconomic backgrounds cre-

ate roadblocks to higher education. That’s why, in addition to being a first-generation law student, Clark County resident and fulltime enrollee, scholarship applicants must be an active member of Boyd Law School’s Black Law Students Association or a similar organization that’s committed to meeting the needs of populations historically underrepresented in higher education (including in law schools).

For Hamilton, the two gifts demonstrate the law school’s ongoing and resolute commitment to diversity and inclusion.

“First, this gift is about expanding access to a legal education and helping students who are in need,” says Hamilton, whose $125,000 donation includes funds earmarked to cover the costs of students who work for the law school’s faculty, as well as students experiencing financial distress because of the COVID-19 pandemic. “But it’s also a way of ensuring that the student population of Nevada’s only law school always reflects the diversity of our state and provides opportunities to all—particularly those who bring the perspective of firstgeneration students from historically underserved groups.”

HOW TO GIVE To learn more about the Ruby Duncan and Judge Addeliar Guy scholarships, or to make a donation to either scholarship fund, visit: Law.UNLV.edu/ Alumni/Giving Or contact Nakia Jackson-Hale at Nakia.Jackson-

2020 | UNLV Law

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INTERESTING INSIGHTS INTO THE BOYD COMMUNITY WHO KNEW?

Let’s Get to Work NEW WORKPLACE LAW CLUB QUICKLY FINDS A HOME (AND A LOT OF SUPPORT) ON CAMPUS

BY PATRICK EVERSON Fledgling student-run organizations often need time to hit their stride, and understandably so, since collaborating with others to define objectives and ultimately achieve goals generally doesn’t happen overnight.

But when an organization meets a previously unfilled need and has dedicated people in place, it can expedite the path to success.

Such has been the case for the Workplace Law Club, one of the newest organizations at the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law. Founded during the Spring 2018 semester as an employment and labor law club, the group has made headway in a hurry as a natural fit for a school with a renowned Workplace Law Program.

In fact, the Workplace Law Club had such an impactful start that it was voted Boyd Law School’s best new club for 2019-20.

“People are interested in workplace law, generally,” says Theresa Thibeau, the club’s president for the 2020-21 academic year.

“One of the reasons I chose to attend Boyd was because of its Workplace Law Program.”

After sorting out the logistics of creating a new club, the leadership team—led

by President Erika Smolyar—shifted into event-planning mode to not only educate and inspire existing members but attract newcomers. Two of those events during the 2019-20 academic year were particularly enlightening, Thibeau says, in part because they addressed important and topical issues.

In partnership with the Organization of Women Law Students, the Workplace Law Club cohosted a gathering in November 2019 that featured Nevada State Senator Pat Spearman as a guest speaker and focused on specific employment legislative reform pertaining to pay equity and equality. Then in February, the organization welcomed justice organizations from across the United States for the Alto Polimigra 2020 conference, which addressed concerns with immigration and customs enforcement practices and discussed ways to work together to sup14

UNLV Law | 2020

Theresa Thibeau

port justice for migrant workers.

Unfortunately, about a month after the conference, the COVID-19 pandemic hit, slowing the organization’s momentum—but only briefly, as the leadership quickly adjusted on the fly. Recognizing that in-person events weren’t going to be possible, the group turned to technology to spread its message.

In doing so, it was able to engage a broader audience, promoting Zoom events, such as a September seminar about ethics and civility within employment and labor law.

“We had attorneys who are labor and employment law specialists from California, Reno, and Las Vegas,” Thibeau says. “Because people don’t have to commute, they seem more willing or able to be involved.”

Another way in which the Workplace Law Club has been able to press forward: stability within the leadership ranks. While Thibeau has taken over as president, her predecessor, Smolyar, stuck around as vice president. Also, Joey Adamiak, who served as vice president of community relations and fundraising last year, has assumed the role of treasurer, and Edmond Bennett is in his second year as student liaison, promoting events and sharing the club’s mission with fellow part-time students.

Working together from a distance, the team remains committed to accomplishing the objectives highlighted on the club’s 202021 agenda. This includes developing a mentorship program designed to connect Boyd Law School students with practicing attorneys all over the country who would be willing to provide support, institutional wisdom, and—potentially—career opportunities.

“We hope to be able to reach attorneys across the U.S.,” Thibeau said. “That’s potentially nice for people who don’t want to remain in Las Vegas but would like to have connections across the country and learn about opportunities in both employment and labor law [in other jurisdictions].”

Despite its relative infancy, the Workplace Law Club—for which Boyd Law School professors Ann McGinley and Ruben Garcia serve as faculty advisers—has proven to be a big hit with the student body: The club has attracted 60 members, including 22 who joined during the Fall semester.

To Thibeau, the club’s popularity makes sense. “At some point in your life, you’re going to be employed or employing other people,” she says. “Which means in one way or another, we’re all going to deal with employment or labor law in some fashion.”

WHO KNEW?

Welcome Back

BOYD LAW SCHOOL’S PART-TIME AND NONTRADITIONAL STUDENT COMMUNITY CONNECTS THROUGH RESURRECTED CLUB

BY PATRICK EVERSON When Catherine Galvez began her journey as a UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law student in August 2019, she did so with some offcampus responsibilities most of her fellow first-year students didn’t have: a full-time job, a husband, and two teenage stepdaughters.

In that way, Galvez was a nontraditional student. But it didn’t take long for her to learn she wasn’t alone in that category—nor did it take her long to discover that many of her peers were looking for ways to support each other in that commonality.

“So immediately, we started talking about organizations and different clubs that law students can get involved with,” Galvez says, alluding to a group of more than a dozen students, many of whom have full-time jobs, young families and/or are embarking on a second career. “Come to find out there was this organization, but it had been largely defunct for a couple of semesters.”

That would be the Organization of Part-Time and Non-Traditional Law Students (OPLS). Galvez and fellow students Allison Mann, Jake Ward, and Nicole Weis set about the task of reviving the student-run club, starting with running for elected positions in the organization. Galvez was elected OPLS president, with Mann and Ward vice presidents of community relations, and Weis the vice president of philanthropy.

But those titles were really an afterthought. For the quartet, the overarching goal was to work as a team to bring back and expand on the purpose of OPLS. “It’s very much a collaborative effort of the four of us,” Galvez says.

“We worked so hard to get this organization back up and going.”

Once that revival was complete, the group focused on boosting engagement within the club. “So many of the events that the law school hosts are done in the evening or during lunch hours,” Galvez says.

“We work nights, we work mornings. Our goal is to facilitate events in what we call the off hours. It’s also important to stage events that don’t just involve students. Many of us have families, and we want to bring our spouses or significant others to these events, or include the kids—for instance, have a park day and really make OPLS an extension of our family.”

Obviously, the COVID-19 pandemic put a dent in planning such gatherings. At the same time, though, the pandemic heightened the need for OPLS, so that nontraditional students could continue to have that connection to the Boyd Law School community during a time when classes have shifted from on campus to online.

“It absolutely has become more vital,” Galvez says. “You become very overwhelmed very quickly when you start law school, so doing it in the middle of a pandemic is not ideal. That’s why we want to

“You become very overwhelmed very quickly when you start law school, so doing it in the middle of a pandemic is not ideal. That’s why we want to take advantage of the Zoom School of Law, where we can easily and efficiently resurrect our events.”

Catherine Galvez Boyd Law student

take advantage of the Zoom School of Law, where we can easily and efficiently resurrect our events.”

The club’s first virtual event of the 2020-21 academic year was a Zoom mixer on September 18 that reached out to all part-time and nontraditional students, not just those in their first or second years.

The organization also held a virtual trivia night on October 16.

The most important undertaking this year, though, is building on the part-time mentorship program that Weis and the Student Bar Association (SBA) launched last year. The program helps first-year Boyd Law School students connect with practicing attorneys, who offer guidance during what can be an enormously challenging time in the lives of students juggling more than just their law studies.

2020 | UNLV Law

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WHO KNEW?

Getting Practical “Giving students a chance to apply what they learned about health care law and policy with handson, real-world experience and to do it with legislative drafting, that’s unusual.”

Dr. David Orentlicher Boyd Law Professor

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HEALTH LAW COURSE GIVES STUDENTS THE OPPORTUNITY TO ASSIST STATE LEGISLATORS WITH SHAPING IMPORTANT HEALTH-RELATED POLICY

BY LISA JACOB While it’s not uncommon for students to tackle contemporary issues in the classroom, the health law legislation course at the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law takes the classroom to the community, empowering students to have real-world impact on Nevada’s critical social matters.

The course is designed to teach students about the legislative process in general. However, instead of a traditional final exam or research paper, students in Dr. David Orentlicher’s class collaborate with state lawmakers to research and draft bills for introduction to the Nevada Legislature.

“One of our goals of the Health Law Program, as part of a state university and the only law school in the state, is for us to serve as a resource for policy makers and bring our expertise to important questions that our legislators are dealing with,” says Orentlicher, who developed the health law education course when he arrived at Boyd Law School in 2017. “Giving students a chance to apply what they learned about health care law and policy with hands-on, real-world experience and to do it with legislative drafting, that’s unusual.”

Given Orentlicher’s unique background in health (he’s a medical doctor) and the legislative process (he served in the Indiana House of Representatives from 2002-08), the course was a natural addition to his instructional lineup at Boyd, alongside bioethics and constitutional law. He modeled it after speaking with a professor at Georgia State University College of Law in Atlanta who taught something similar.

“The one big difference is the students at Georgia State are not allowed to work with the legislators; they work with advocacy groups instead,” he says.

“For us to be able to work directly with the legislators is very helpful.”

Orentlicher divided his Spring 2020 class into groups of three who prepared bills on four topics regarding the accessibility and costs of health care coverage, and protecting victims of sexual assault. A legislator typically determines the topics, but students may influence or modify those choices.

One unsuccessful bill from the 2019 session that students revived was AB227. Introduced by Assemblywoman Connie Munk, the bill modifies language in Nevada’s sexual assault laws to further define consent and increase protections to victims.

“Assemblywoman Munk wants to bring it back in the 2021 session, so the students worked with her to address the concerns that were raised in 2019 and refine the bill,” Orentlicher says. “Other legislators may have a general concern, such as prescription drug costs or health care costs. The students and I work with the legislators to narrow down [those concerns].

Sometimes the students in their research can expand the topic and may say, ‘In addition to that approach we can add elements to broaden our approach to the problem.’”

Another group worked alongside Assemblywoman Robin L. Titus on a bill to lower health care costs by requiring insurers, hospitals, and physicians to provide patients with information about the costs of care so they can compare prices when choosing health care providers.

A third group helped build on a bill Assemblywoman Melissa Hardy successfully sponsored into law in 2019 that provides more transparency in prescription drug pricing. The legislation protects vulnerable populations, especially senior citizens.

“That’s what she wanted to focus on—seniors and transparency—but was open to other ideas in terms of what we could do to lower prescription drug costs,” says 3L Boyd Law School student Celssie Hardy, who is Hardy’s daughter.

Celssie Hardy’s group researched ways to bolster the positive effects of the new law, comparing similar initiatives in other states, attending committee meetings, and documenting prices of the most-prescribed drugs. The group drafted a bill for negotiations between drug companies and the Medicaid program to lower prescription costs for Nevadans on Medicaid.

“I’m a very hands-on learner, so when I saw the opportunity to actually create and draft legislation that could potentially be sponsored by a legislator, I took it,” Celssie Hardy says. “Doing so enhances your educational experience because you are actually getting to do the groundwork. It gives you a different perspective; you can be more involved in the process and put what you are learning into practice.”

Gillian Block, a 3L at Boyd, says she was drawn to the health law class because she wanted to learn more about the legislative process as well as “the nuts and bolts of writing bills.”

“It was interesting and very practical,” says Block, who will participate in the legislative process next year as part of an externship for a nonprofit organization.

She also might testify about another bill she and her classmates in a fourth group helped write in Orentlicher’s class. The group worked with Assemblywoman Michelle Gorelow on a bill to improve access to prenatal care by expanding the state’s policy on presumptive

WHO KNEW?

HEALTH LAW ADVISORY BOARD

eligibility for Medicaid coverage during pregnancy.

It’s an issue Block feels strongly about, especially in light of widespread unemployment caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Now more than ever, with COVID-19 and with the economic situation, being able to help more women access prenatal care and have positive birth outcomes would be incredibly meaningful,” says Block, who worked on health care issues for U.S. Senator Catherine Cortez Masto’s office in Reno. “To help [Gorelow’s] idea come to fruition would be absolutely amazing.”

Through the class, Block says she gained a lot of valuable knowledge about the legislative process. “We learned about lobbying in the most granular way, [such as] how to address committee members, what the rules are in Nevada for how a committee is run, and some best practices for making a presentation if you’re going to go before a legislator and try to pass a bill.”

Block and her fellow Boyd Law School students will have to wait until the Nevada Legislature convenes in 2021 to see if their work passes the ultimate test. However, one thing is known: Their professor will have a front-row seat in Carson City as a freshman member of the Nevada State Assembly. That’s because Orentlicher won the Democratic primary for Assembly District 20 in June and faced no opposition for the seat in the November general election.

Dr. David Orentlicher

Connie Akridge, JD, MBA, Holland & Hart, Las Vegas Office Barbara Atkinson, MD, UNLV School of Medicine Founding Dean Lawrence Barnard, MBA, Dignity Health – St. Rose Dominican, San Martin Campus Suzanne Bierman, JD, MPH Annette Bradley, JD, Southern Nevada Health District Michelle Chino, Ph.D., Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, UNLV School of Public Health Peter Christiansen, JD, Christiansen Law Offices Renee Coffman, Ph.D., RPh, Roseman University of Health Sciences Georgia Dounis, DDS, MS, Interdisciplinary Center on Aging Research & Education, UNLV School of Dental Medicine Janet Dufek, MS, Ph.D., UNLV Department of Kinesiology and Nutrition Sciences Carole Fisher, Nathan Adelson Hospice Samantha Fredrickson, JD, Planned Parenthood of Southern Nevada Paul Janda, DO, JD, Valley Hospital Medical Center Neurology Residency Program Sam Kaufman, MS, Henderson Hospital Deborah Kuhls, MD, FACS, FCCM, Professor of Surgery, and Principal Academic Officer, Las Vegas Campus, University of Nevada School of Medicine John O’Reilly, JD, MBA, O’Reilly Law Group, chair, University Medical Center Governing Board Cheryl Perna, MSN, RN, UNLV School of Nursing Melissa Piasecki, MD, University of Nevada School of Medicine Susan Pitz, JD, MBA, University Medical Center Michael Saltman, JD, The Vista Group Lynn Stange, RN, BSN, MA, CHC, Nathan Adelson Hospice Vincent Thomas, MD, MHA, FHRS, Children’s Hospital and Medical Center - Omaha, Nebraska John Valery White, JD, William S. Boyd School of Law Dylan Wint, MD, Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health 2020 | UNLV Law

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UNLV’s Gaming Law Curriculum Is Now More Accessible

Professional Programs In partnership with GVC Holdings, the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law announces new online training programs in gaming law and regulation. These programs are designed for operators, regulators, lawyers, and others working in the gaming industry.

Participants are not required to have a Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree to enroll.

Online training courses include: • • • •

Introduction to Gaming Law and Regulation with Anthony Cabot Introduction to Gaming Operations with Uri Clinton The Legal and Operational Environment for Sports Betting with Keith Miller Player Accountability & Corporate Social Responsibility in Gaming Law with Alan Feldman and Dayvid Figler • Public Policy and Comparative Study of Gaming Laws and Regulations with Simon Planzer

Visit the website to add yourself to the professional progams update list law.unlv.edu/gaming-law/professional-programs | gradlaw@unlv.edu

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UNLV Law | 2020

WHO KNEW?

A Hands-Off Approach GAMING LAW STUDENTS OFFER A REGULATORY HELPING HAND AS NEVADA FINALLY INCHES CLOSER TO INTRODUCING CASHLESS GAMING

BY PATRICK EVERSON Long before anyone heard about COVID-19, let alone realized its devastating impacts, the need to embrace a cashless economy was already quite clear in various business sectors. Nevada’s anchor industry, casino gaming, certainly understood the value of and demand for such transaction options, but gaming regulations—rightly strenuous, but arguably behind the times—hindered that transition.

“There was always a gradual transformation on the casino floor to contactless forms of transactions—the demise of tokens, the increase in different types of ways to fund accounts,” says Anthony Cabot, who leads the Gaming Law Program at the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law. “It’s been a really slow process. But COVID-19 brought to light that there are already many patrons who have moved to cashless with [retail] purchases, such as their daily coffee. COVID just accelerated the trend.

“Unfortunately, the gaming industry is still significantly behind retail industries that don’t have the regulatory restrictions that a casino has, both at the state and federal level.”

Sensing a need for the state to clear those regulatory hurdles—and quickly—Cabot enlisted the help of his gaming law students. For the past several months, those students have tried to turn very sour COVID lemons into cashless gaming lemonade via policy reform that would bring the gaming industry into the 21st century.

“A lot of the research that has gone into the best practices for regulatory reform has come out of directed research some of our students did over the summer,” Cabot says. “[The pandemic] has allowed the Boyd School of Law to take a look at these cutting-edge issues and provide insight and guidance from a policy perspective.”

For several years, cashless gaming had been explored through two primary lenses: convenience (for the customer) and efficiency (for the casino). That partially explains why momentum for cashless gaming was slow to build—it wasn’t considered a necessity for industry survival.

That all changed, however, when the pandemic penetrated Nevada’s borders in March. Almost immediately, gaming law students began observing casinos’ methods for dealing with COVID, both short and long term. The key question to address: What about the fact

that the casino customer has to touch everything?

“From cash machines to chips at the table, so much interaction involves constant touching. You start to look at all those different touchpoints and ask: How do we reduce that?” Cabot says. “All those things have to be reimagined.”

While Cabot explored cashless options in Nevada casinos in a report he hopes to publish soon, his students went to work on regulatory changes to achieve a more touch-free casino floor—changes such as a greater allowance of credit cards and services such as PayPal for use in gaming, along with smartphone e-wallets.

“The industry has to adjust to the spending habits of its patrons, not expect the patrons to adjust to the payment methods of the industry,” Cabot says. “At the same time, to ensure customer acceptance of the casino experience again, there has to be the perception that casinos are operating with the utmost caution.”

That’s why the regulatory policy work being done by gaming law students is so vital. For gaming to introduce more cashless gaming options, it first must ensure that those options pass legal muster. Only then can the industry—whose long-term survival hinges on its ability to adapt to the “new normal”—make that long-overdue leap into the 21st century.

GAMING LAW ADVISORY BOARD Michael Alonso, Alonso Law Limited Stuart M. Altman, Las Vegas Sands Corp Bo Bernhard, International Gaming Institute, UNLV Peter Bernhard, Kaempfer Crowell Joe Bertolone, International Center for Gaming Regulation, UNLV Jan Jones Blackhurst Michael Brunet, Snow Covered Capital A.G. Burnett, McDonald Carano Mark Clayton, Greenberg Traurig Jacob Coin, San Manuel Band of Mission Indians Bill Curran, Ballard Spahr Lou Dorn, Monarch Casino & Resort, Inc. M. Daron Dorsey, Ainsworth Game Technology Mark Dunn, Baha Mar Katie Fellows, JC Hospitality Greg Gemignani, Dickinson Wright Phyllis Gilland, Golden Entertainment P. Gregory Giordano, McDonald Carano Becky Harris, International Center for Gaming Regulation, UNLV A.J. (Bud) Hicks, McDonald Carano Jeff Ifrah Ifrah PLLC Terry Johnson, Nevada Gaming Control Board Yvette Landau, W.A. Richardson Builders Katie Lever Mark Lipparelli, Galaxy Gaming Martin Lycka, GVC John McManus, MGM Resorts International Kevin Mullally, Gaming Labs International Dennis Neilander, Kaempfer Crowell Luke Orchard IGT Maren Parry, Ballard Spahr Anthony Pearl, The Cosmopolitan Dan Reaser, Fennemore Craig Jeffrey Rodefer Esq. Lewis Roca, Rothgerber Christie Karl Rutledge, Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie Scott Scherer, Brownstein Farber Hyatt Schreck Frank Schreck, Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck Jeffrey Silver, Dickinson Wright Keith Smith, Boyd Gaming Sylvia Tiscareno, William Hill Ellen Whittemore, Wynn Resorts of Las Vegas 2020 | UNLV Law

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Leading the March for Change As the nation clamors for substantive social justice reform, the Boyd School of Law is advancing the cause through innovative and impactful courses, programs and community initiatives

By Steve Bornfeld

2020 | UNLV Law

21

SOCIAL JUSTICE—or the glar-

ing, galling lack of it—has been a jolt to the nervous system of America in 2020. It’s also a bolt of lightning electrifying the curriculum at the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law—especially now and for the foreseeable future.

“It’s important to be at the forefront of these issues because we are a public law school and this is a matter of extreme public concern,” says Boyd Law School professor Frank Rudy Cooper, the director and co-facilitator of the school’s Race, Gender & Policing (RG&P) program. “Social justice really captured the national conversation from May and into this summer, and therefore it’s something we ought to be talking about.”

These critical social justice discussions have actually been ongoing at the Boyd School of Law since its doors opened more than 20 years ago. Through the work of its Community Service Program, the Thomas & Mack Legal Clinic, and student organizations such as the Black Law Students Association (BLSA), La Voz (Latinx students), and the Middle Eastern Law Students Association, the law school has embraced its obligation to advocate for substantive change throughout its first two decades.

This year, though—unlike any other—the outcry for social justice reform has been deafening. Pull out any headline flashpoints from the past several months to prove that point: George Floyd; Breonna Taylor; Jacob Blake; nationwide peaceful protests (including in Las Vegas); episodes of looting; the streets of Portland, Oregon, teeming with protesters and hazily identified federal law enforcement hauling them off; vigilante shooter Kyle Rittenhouse; and, of course, Black Lives Matter.

Rarely has news of the world and the world of academia come so face to face, nose to nose. And Nevada’s law school was ready—and ahead of the curve.

“Boyd is at the forefront because many of the students and professors were already working on and involved in some of these issues for a long time,” says Boyd Law professor Addie Rolnick, who facilitates the RG&P program alongside Cooper and fellow professor Stewart Chang. “We already had a lot going on here that is relevant to what’s now happening across the nation.”

Conceived by Cooper in fall 2018 and launched in spring 2019, the RG&P program is a docket of initiatives that explore themes related to race, gender, and policing in Nevada. And policing is not just about police officers, but also prison and immigration officials, schools and civilians, and how sur22

UNLV Law | 2020

From left, Boyd Law School professors Stewart Chang, Elizabeth MacDowell, Frank Rudy Cooper, and Addie Rolnick are spearheading programs designed to help generate much-needed social justice reform. veillance and control are practiced.

The program’s docket: panel discussions, symposiums, lectures, published journals, academic research, a specially designed class, two groundbreaking clinics, and a pre-law program for underrepresented communities. Activists, law enforcement representatives, and efforts to create statewide legislative reform all play a role as well.

The overarching goal? Empower law students with the knowledge and skills to effectuate change in the community. But it’s essentially about what any institution of higher learning should do: provide knowledge and create awareness, particularly about issues— some dating back to this nation’s founding— that have boiled over more this year than at any time since the tumultuous 1960s.

“In a larger context of not only Boyd but UNLV, with its diverse population, issues of race should be at the forefront of what we’re doing,” Chang says. “In the same way that after taking a contracts [class] with me [students] should be able to read a contract and be able to tell what’s going on, by the same token, when those same students are asked their opinion about what’s going on in the country—should police be held accountable? why is there unrest?— they should be able to give an intelligible answer to that as well.”

The impact of recent events is reflected in the increased interest of Boyd Law School students. “After the 2016 presidential election, student enrollment in my civil rights

class went up significantly,” Rolnick observes, “and then even more significantly this year.”

Interest in these issues goes back years for Cooper. One stunning statistic he often cites: In 2011, 685,724 civilians were targets of New York City’s highly controversial stop-and-frisk actions. About 85 percent of those stopped and interrogated were African American or Latinx, the vast majority of them innocent.

“These are issues I’ve been concerned about for a long time,” Cooper says. “Not just policing issues, which I deal with in my criminal procedure-investigation class, but also issues of race and gender and class and religion and sexual orientation—how identity affects policing,” Cooper says. “The main reason I came here was that I knew I would have colleagues who were interested in these issues—not only professors Chang and Rolnick, but other colleagues I found also were fellow travelers.”

Among the highlights of Boyd Law School’s innovative social justice efforts: NEW COURSE: “LAW AND INEQUALITY: POLICING, PROTEST, AND REFORM”

Although Rolnick notes that this new onecredit class “is not a child of the program” per se, there is much overlap between them.

It was added, she says, as “an emergency measure” after the summer’s events and possible reforms in their wake.

Cooper, Rolnick, Chang and associate professor Eve Hanan co-teach the class to about 130 students, including all 1Ls (for whom the course is required) and many 2Ls and 3Ls who choose the course as an elective.

“We cover a range of topics because we have overlapping expertise,” Rolnick says.

“We do it in a lecture-discussion format. Our

goal is to provide context and understanding for the movement aspect of the protests and the calls for change that were unfolding.

But there’s also background knowledge we feel students need to [better] understand the various proposals coming out of those movements.”

This includes the so-called—and some say misrepresented—calls to “defund the police.”

“The theory of the class is that everybody needs to know what’s happening here, no matter what your opinion might be,” Rolnick says. “We’ve been very careful to structure the course as informational, and students of course are allowed to have different positions on the policy proposals.”

Context counts, Chang says, referring to broadly teaching issues about social justice in this and related classes.

“For many [students], it’s the first time they are encountering it. It can challenge their original mindset,” Chang says, citing one student who formerly worked in law enforcement. “But she’s also able to offer her own perspective from the point of view of law enforcement.

“I wouldn’t say it’s controversial. These laws did exist; Jim Crow did happen. It’s hard to argue against that, but then we can ask, ‘How did we arrive at this moment?’ It’s not just a couple of bad apples or bad cops, but rather a larger structural issue that exists.”

MISDEMEANOR CLINIC

Launched in 2018 under the direction of Hanan and professor Anne Traum, the Misdemeanor Clinic may be the most impactful initiative of Boyd Law’s social justice efforts in terms of pure volume of legal assistance.

Staffed by six student attorneys—all of them 2Ls or 3Ls who offer help to a largely lower-income, minority clientele in the local community—the Misdemeanor Clinic deals with a stark reality: More citizens become entangled in the legal system via misdemeanors than any other court classification.

Many are arrested, detained, and required to return to court (which may mean missing work or arranging for child care). And after cases are adjudicated, many are forced to pay fees and fines.

One more indignity: Those charged with misdemeanors aren’t automatically entitled to counsel, particularly if the state isn’t seeking jail time. That means defendants who aren’t knowledgeable in the law are forced to navigate legal procedures themselves.

Enter the clinic.

“Reports examining access to counsel in criminal cases have noted the need for more and better representation for misdemeanors,

Anne Traum, Boyd Law professor

Eve Hanan, Boyd Law associate professor

because they affect so many people,” Hanan says. “We talked to judges and the public defender’s office to identify this need.”

While not as serious as felonies, misdemeanor charges—parking, traffic, and trespassing citations; petty theft; simple assault; vandalism; and battery—aren’t to be taken lightly. Ignoring them can lead to stronger charges and/or increased (and substantial) fines.

“A lot of our work this semester focuses on fines and fees,” Traum says. “So many people are facing criminal fines and fees they cannot afford, which results in ongoing court debt that can be debilitating. Also hanging over them is the possibility of arrest or the loss of driving privileges. Then you throw on top of that the hardships created by the [COVID-19] pandemic, and this is such an extraordinary time of need for many. That’s why our clinic has partnered with a national organization called the Fines and Fees Justice Center, which is pursuing policy reform in Nevada.”

Especially relevant to social justice these days are misdemeanors arising from protests over the racial tensions that reached a boiling point during the summer, including in Southern Nevada. Protest-related charges can include unlawful assembly or failure to disperse.

“The real issue is that it chills [free] speech,” Hanan says of the protest arrests.

“People don’t know why they were charged with failing to disperse or why police deemed their assembly unlawful. They’re out of custody, but they don’t go back out and protest. They thought they were engaged in a lawful protest and don’t understand why what they did was illegal.”

Such charges might be minor on the legal spectrum, but in working on the cases, student attorneys in the Misdemeanor Clinic learn a great deal about investigative work.

Difficulties arise, however, because few in the legal community spend much time on these cases, producing little in the way of

law precedent to guide the students.

“These cases rarely get litigated in court, which means there’s a lack of published opinions,” Traum says. “Because there is so little precedent on misdemeanor offenses, our students actually do pioneering work developing the legal arguments in their cases. And to fully evaluate their cases, they often do as much investigative work as they would for a more serious case.”

POLICING AND PROTEST CLINIC

Another new law school initiative, the Policing and Protest Clinic provides students a hands-on experience in community-centered advocacy aimed at combatting institutionalized and systemic forms of inequality and subordination.

Founded by professor Elizabeth MacDowell, this clinic was created in response to Floyd’s murder and law enforcement’s subsequent violent response to protests calling for justice. The clinic collaborates with community groups, activists, local attorneys, and individuals impacted by police violence.

“This is a direct result of student passion,” MacDowell says. “The best thing about teaching any clinic is working with such smart and dedicated students, and those in the Policing and Protest Clinic have been especially committed to the work and creatively using the law for social justice.”

The eight student attorneys enrolled in the clinic during the fall semester defended clients in court, pursued legislative reforms, sought to limit the collateral consequences of criminal convictions, and developed a knowyour-rights curriculum for community outreach. Representing a client arrested in the 2020 summer protests, the student attorneys challenged the constitutionality of a Nevada statute that criminalizes failing to disperse upon order of police, arguing the law is vague and infringes on speech and assembly rights.

“Legal advocacy in a politically charged context is a master class in strategy and cli2020 | UNLV Law

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ent communication,” MacDowell says. “I’m proud that we have been successful in choosing meaningful approaches to a complex and potentially overwhelming set of problems.”

LEGISLATIVE ACTION

As incendiary as the summer’s events were, they also opened avenues to discuss reforms on the national, state, and local levels—and that tapped into another of Boyd’s social justice strengths.

As Rolnick explains: “We were a bit involved in [policy reform] previously, but now there’s a big opportunity for us to weigh in as experts concerning what would be good and desirable options for police reform. Because the Nevada Legislature considered this in a special session over the summer and will likely consider measures again, we have been [providing] direct input on those options. What we’re doing is most directly related to community work.”

NEVADA LAW JOURNAL/SYMPOSIUM

Guest-edited by the program’s faculty, the April 2021 edition of the Nevada Law Journal will be devoted to the Race, Gender & Policing program’s initiatives. Scholars of law, criminology, and related fields will contribute to both the publication and a corresponding symposium. Expected topics include: • Analyses of how police officers view both race and gender • Constitutional issues surrounding the policing of both race and gender • Criminalization of Latinx identities • Police assaults against women of color • Policing of LGBTQ+ in Asia • Differential race and gender effects of private patrolling of space • Policing of Native women • Racial profiling and masculinities • Disappearances of women in Mexico, the U.S., Canada, and elsewhere • Disparities in policing in schools • Differential racial effects of low rapeclearance rates “We have faculty members here at Boyd working on articles [for the Nevada Law Journal], and we have quite a few people from other law schools who are also contributing,” Chang says. “We’re doing the introduction as well, and we’re giving the historical context of how we’ve arrived at this moment.”

One of the purposes of the project is to turn the lens in rarely viewed directions when it comes to issues burning up today’s headlines.

“In particular the issue of looting—reconsid24

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ering looting and the protection of property that, granted, historically in the early days of the nation brought us to where we are today,” Chang says. “[Early looting] laws were based on looting the land of Native Americans and looting the labor of African Americans, and much of the later laws were built to protect those interests. We’re flipping the script and looking at it from a different perspective.”

COMMUNITY PANEL DISCUSSIONS

“This fall has been difficult,” says Rolnick, referring to the limits on gatherings as a result of COVID-19. “But last year we worked most visibly with the Mob Museum, conducting two different events—panel discussions and conferences. One was on criminal justice reform and the other brought together a representative from the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, representatives from the

community who had been victimized by police violence, and academics to talk about the issue of police violence. We also worked with our Black Law Students Association, which hosted a panel this summer that featured some of the RG&P faculty as guest speakers.”

THE JUSTICE MICHAEL L. DOUGLAS PRE-LAW FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM

Lawyers are made at Boyd, but their passion for the profession can develop much sooner. That’s where this program comes in, encouraging Nevada high school and undergraduate students from underrepresented communities to consider and prepare for a legal education.

Launched this year, the program is dedicated to supporting first-generation and diverse student populations. It includes one week of simulated law school classes in

CLOSING ARGUMENT

criminal law and legal writing and analysis, as well as LSAT prep. During the week, fellowship recipients receive pointers on applying for, and succeeding in, law school.

The program’s namesake, Michael L. Douglas, is the first African American justice to sit on the bench of the Nevada Supreme Court.

Appointed to the court in March 2004 (and elected three times afterward), Douglas served as chief justice in 2011 and 2018.

Now retired, the Los Angeles native arrived in Las Vegas in 1982, launching his Nevada legal career as an attorney with Nevada Legal Services.

SENATOR HARRY REID CIVIC DIALOGUE PROGRAM

Harry Reid, the former U.S. Senate majority leader from Searchlight, is spearheading

a new lecture series that brings in experts to discuss racism targeted at specific communities.

Reid, who is also a Boyd Law School Distinguished Fellow in Law and Policy, has already welcomed such lecturers as author/historian Deborah Lipstadt and journalist Jonathan Weisman, who discussed modern manifestations of anti-Semitism and bigotry on the rise nationwide; and Leila Fadel, a Las Vegas-based national correspondent for National Public Radio who hosted a panel discussing the historical and modern-day experiences of Muslims in America. Then in October, the law school hosted Black in America, a two-day virtual event that began with “A Conversation on Voting Rights and Equality,” featuring former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.

Yes, the news of the world and the world of Boyd have indeed come face to face, nose to nose. But even if national diversions put space between them—you know, like a global pandemic, a crashing economy, climate change, and seismic political shifts in Washington, D.C.—what makes Boyd’s Race, Gender & Policing program vital will remain.

“The program existed before all these events unfolded this summer,” Rolnick says. “Although I’d like to believe that the police violence problem will be solved immediately, I’m fairly certain it won’t be, so we will continue. Right now we have the opportunity to be involved in the direct responses of the community. But even if that interest changes in the [aftermath] of the election, a lot of work still will need to be done.

“I do some work on civil rights remedies regarding police violence. Some things changed under the Trump administration, but even under President Obama, there were questions about what the federal government was doing and could be doing related to police violence. So a change in administration doesn’t necessarily answer a lot of those questions.”

Taking a similar long view, Chang reaches back even further.

“When I was a teenager, we had the Los Angeles uprising of 1992 after the officers charged with beating Rodney King were acquitted,” he says. “Before that you had the Watts riots and Jim Crow. Even though the most recent protests are about something different, unfortunately the more pessimistic side of me says this is not going to go away, either—even with any kind of meaningful reform.

“Granted, the Obama administration tried to respond to the riots in Ferguson [Missouri, in 2014] by putting together a presidential task force and came up with recommendations that were abandoned by the Trump administration. Even so, that task force seemed like it was only suggesting incremental changes and not looking at anything groundbreaking. So this is going to be a long haul.”

And through its groundbreaking Race, Gender & Policing program—among a host of other important and impactful initiatives—the Boyd School of Law is committed to being a driving force for substantial (and long-overdue) social justice reform.

The kind that will forever extinguish systemic racism.

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ZOOMING INTO THE FUTURE Through preparation and innovation, the Boyd Law School community overcame pandemicinduced challenges and put graduates in position to succeed upon entering the legal profession’s new virtual reality | By Steve Bornfeld

P

icture this phrase: “Boot Camp.”

What images does the brain conjure?

Pushups … or logins? Physical stress … or technological tests? Marching in line … or learning online?

You picked the latter each time? Nailed it, cadet. Now count off, one-two, count off, three-four …

“We had more than a hundred law students go through this boot camp voluntarily for no credit. That’s a good chunk of our entire law school,” says Joe Regalia, associate professor of law at the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law—but think of him as the world’s jolliest drill sergeant who was charged with creating the school’s Virtual Lawyering Boot Camp in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Boot Camp” is an evocative title for a program unfolding entirely behind keyboards, in which the blood, sweat, and tears are written in coding, passwords, and links.

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“What I heard back from some students [who attended the camp] is they were able to get [jobs] they wouldn’t have been able to get otherwise—that after graduation they hit the ground running with their employers,” Regalia says. “It was a great example of the incredible things we can accomplish when we’re forced to do things differently.

Why weren’t all law schools doing this all summer?

“Obviously, this is a horrible time, but this is a silver lining in my mind. I’m passionate about it, that’s for sure.”

In a world turned inside-out and tied up in knots by a pandemic, Regalia’s techie troops are among those manning the front lines of the law school’s swift, strong response when so much of daily life— from schools to businesses to interpersonal relationships—have relocated from the actual to the virtual.

Life is online like never before.

We’ll get back to boot camp. But first let’s take a pandemic-world overview of the law school’s techno embrace.

“When I teach students about tech, it’s not about how to use it, where to click, how to log in. It’s to teach them that the tools are available and [about] the method or process for using them to provide a good outcome for your client,” says Lori D. Johnson, associate professor at the Boyd School of Law. Johnson’s tech-savvy is manifested in her recent article, “Navigating Technology Competence in Transactional Practice,” published in the Villanova Law Review just before the COVID-19 pandemic swamped the globe like a viral tsunami, making her analysis a must-read for academics.

“Our students have always used LexisNexis and Westlaw and those legal search engines to perform their research in our classroom,” says Johnson, also noting basic tools most of us know, such as Microsoft Word and Excel. “But there are a variety of advanced legal writing tools out there, some of which I highlight in the article. These include document design tools and, particularly, artificial intelligence tools in research.”

Benefits? Numerous. Here’s one: “In the article I cite a study that showed how much time attorneys spend grappling with technology,” Johnson says. “If attorneys were better taught and better equipped on that front before beginning their careers, they could save a lot of time that could be used to expand the reach of their legal services. If they had an extra hour, could they do more pro bono work for clients in need?”

Johnson’s article also devotes significant attention to Comment 8 to the American Bar Association’s Model Rule of Professional Conduct 1.1 (outlining a lawyer’s requisite competence). It was amended in 2012 to require attorneys to “keep abreast of changes in the law and its practice, including the benefits and risks associated with relevant technology.” In the ensuing years, as technology has ramped up, Comment 8 has drawn increased debate about its rather vague parameters.

The State Bar of Nevada is not among the 38 states that have adopted Comment 8, though all states can consult it for guidance.

Johnson has a few thoughts on that.

“It’s an important indicator that the ABA has determined that the ability to use relevant technology is a component of an attorney’s competence to ethically represent their client,” she says. “The passage of Comment 8 started a sea change in the legal profession in terms of, ‘What do I need to know?’”

In addition to spurring differing opin28

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“The schools that really rose to the task were the handful like Boyd that were ready for the pandemic and were innovative.

Boyd has several advantages that allowed us to really use [the pandemic] as an opportunity to jump ahead and give our students more skills, in spite of some [logistical] challenges.”

Joe Regalia Boyd School of Law associate professor

ions on how to determine a baseline of technological competence that attorneys are required to have to serve clients, Comment 8 magnified the importance of teaching nextgen law students about tech tools.

Then, of course, it became imperative during the pandemic. But all was not equal in the tech-teaching realm.

“I found there is very little guidance for lawyers who do transactional lawyering, corporate and real estate law, which is what I practice,” Johnson says. Tech assistance is much more available for courtroom litigators, she notes, even though a large proportion of lawyers deal with transactions that take place outside of a courtroom.

The Boyd School of Law has taken hightech steps to address the issue—for students and professors alike. “So many of us have now been forced to become more creative in how we teach, encouraging all of our faculty to think about our delivery of content to students,” Johnson says. “All of our students are learning remotely, and everybody is getting onboard with it.”

Tools being deployed include the artificial intelligence-incorporating “Ravel Law,” a legal research, analytics, and visualization platform that allows students to mine published case opinions to gain legal insights and build arguments. “[Ravel Law] uses a graphical view to

perform legal research,” Johnson says. “And since I no longer have my whiteboard, it helps me show students graphically some connections between the law, which we can pull up online.”

As a teacher of legal research and writing, Johnson helps students develop effective electronic communication skills, emphasizing the level of formality that clients, colleagues, and judges expect.

“We have students who have come of age in the time of texting and Twitter and who maybe are not as comfortable putting together more of a formal, professional, polished email,” she adds.

Additional tools Johnson favors include “Contract Catch,” a subscription service for uploading contract drafts; applying proprietary rules; flagging errors, legal inconsistencies and troublesome language; and suggesting alternative avenues of research.

A related program, “Brief Catch,” accomplishes the same for legal briefs.

But these services aren’t exactly cheap.

“Not all students will have access to those,” Johnson says. “So I try to make students aware of the free and low-cost legal tools available so they can meet their ethical obligation to be technologically competent.”

Meeting them is great. Exceeding them is even greater. Enter boot camp commander Regalia. Even before implementing the much-needed summer program, he saw the Boyd School of Law as a perfect place to bring his passion for technological innovations in a field that has been slow to adapt.

“Courts and judges, for the most part, never wanted to use technology. Also, law firms use old tools,” Regalia says. “And that’s a United States thing. If you look at other countries like China, they were conducting court proceedings online long before the pandemic. So [American law schools] went into the pandemic kind of behind the 8-ball.

“The schools that really rose to the task were the handful like Boyd that were ready for it and were innovative. We have several advantages that allowed us to really use [the pandemic] as an opportunity to jump ahead and give our students more technological skills, in spite of some [logistical] challenges.”

One such advantage: Being relatively young, Regalia says, the law school’s practices were not so entrenched and resistant to change. Also, the school already had online training programs in the works before the pandemic.

“UNLV embraces change,” Regalia says.

“Everyone here is open to doing things in new ways, and that attitude is why we were able to handle this better than most law schools.

“I’ve seen so many of our professors using more practical exercises to try to make up for the fact that they can’t be there in person—doing things like using virtual breakout rooms with teams of law students working on projects and doing simulations. And it’s so easy to use Zoom to do oral arguments.”

Also advantageous is the access students have to walking, talking legal wisdom.

“Thanks to technology,” Regalia says, “we’re able to harness folks from outside of the state and even across the world to teach our students, because they don’t have to travel.”

During his classes’ oral argument exercises—one of the semester milestones for his students—Regalia attempted to find local attorneys who could squeeze into their schedules a little time to share some virtual knowledge with students. Also last spring via videoconference, about 30 judges and attorneys joined his students from throughout the U.S., providing valuable feedback and forging relationships with the up-and-coming lawyers.

And then there was boot camp.

“We were running a pilot program that I was directing with some of our first-year students to create apps to help Nevadans represent themselves in court … by preparing documents for themselves,” Regalia recalls.

When the pandemic exploded, Regalia conferred with the law school’s leadership and fellow faculty. “I said, ‘With everything becoming virtual for our students, and with legal employers not able to afford to train their law students and graduates, we could do so much good if we could put together a program with two main goals.”

Goal No. 1: Present students with new technology tools so they could do what law students traditionally did in the past to get experience, even if they couldn’t do it in person. Goal No. 2: By giving students those tools, law firms, government groups, and other potential employers wouldn’t have to use their own time and resources to train Boyd graduates.

Augmented with ideas Regalia solicited from attorneys and judges from across the country, the three-week “camp” launched in May. It was a concentrated cannon shot of tech learning that blended video and live training sessions.

Among the visiting instructors: Judge Brenda Weksler of Nevada U.S. District

“When I teach students about tech, it’s not about how to use it, where to click, how to log in. It’s to teach them that the tools are available and [about] the method or process for using them to provide a good outcome for your client.”

Lori D. Johnson Boyd School of Law associate professor

Court; Chris Brown, CEO of Venture Legal (Kansas City, Missouri); Cheryl A. Grames, partner with Lewis, Brisbois, Bisgaard & Smith; Dorna Moini, founder/CEO of legal tech company Documate (Los Angeles); Stephanie J. Glantz, litigation attorney at Bailey Kennedy LLP; and Jordan Gardner, a Boyd Law School graduate who is the cofounder and CEO of Law Student Connect (Boise, Idaho).

Because of timing issues, no academic credits were awarded for attending the camp. Still, about a quarter of the school’s student population flocked to it, understanding they not only would be gaining critical knowledge, but also boosting their post-graduation employment prospects.

The camp was so successful and informative that Regalia plans to do it again in 2021.

Speaking of real-world experience …

“We started talking to students about remote working in the spring,” says Rachael Adair, Boyd Law School’s assistant dean for career development, who works with a dedicated and experienced team to facilitate student internships, externships, clerkships, and job opportunities.

Like virtually everything else, Adair’s way of working also had to be pandemic-adjusted.

“For our office, it required a lot of coordination between employers and students.

The employers had to figure out whether they would continue to have a summer associate or law clerk program for students,” she says. “Among the private law firm employers we regularly work with, 99 percent decided to proceed with some form of a summer associate program. They had to scramble to reframe and reformat it into remote programs, but they made that commitment.”

What about post-pandemic work?

“There will probably be some hybrid mix scenario,” Adair says. “There are certain employers that probably won’t be open to remote [work]—the courts and some of the government employers will want to return to in-person. But some of the private law firms [likely] will be more flexible regarding remote working.”

Which begs the next question: Will the Boyd School of Law treat these pandemicinduced techno upgrades as mere educational stopgaps and eventually revert to stressing in-person skills over virtual measures? Bet the other way.

“I’ve already begun to hear that employers are taking a long, hard look into expenses they put into renting office space,” Johnson says. “This pandemic has proven to employers that a work-from-home model can be efficient.”

Narrowing that view to the legal profession, Johnson says it’s likely that certain aspects will return to the in-person model.

Hearings and trials, for instance, present more difficulties because evidence must be logged remotely and witnesses cross-examined without their full body language accessible to be interpreted.

“But from the law office perspective, the justification for having people in the space is not as urgent,” Johnson says. “I don’t know if that’s good or bad, socially or psychologically. But from a marketability perspective, it’s definitely a reason for our students to be as technologically skilled as they can be.”

So count on the Boyd School of Law to continue hurtling into the future.

“Our law professors—even though they’re just as experienced and raised in the same atmosphere as all these other law professors at other schools—they handle things so much better,” says Regalia, our boot camp commander/drill sergeant. “They truly embrace online learning.”

Yes, a killer pandemic is wreaking havoc throughout the land, making “as you were” an impossible command. But Sarge Regalia and his Boyd School of Law colleagues have found new, inventive ways to “carry on”— and that’s well worth a hearty salute.

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SCHOLARSHIPS, PRESENTATIONS, AND OTHER NEWS

FACULTY FOCUS

The Skies, the Limits PROFESSOR REBECCA SCHARF STUDIES HOW DRONES POTENTIALLY INTRUDE ON CIVIL LIBERTIES

BY PAUL SZYDELKO The COVID-19 pandemic has inspired even more creative uses for drones, but UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law Professor Rebecca Scharf is studying how these overhead devices potentially invade privacy—and how to avoid flying into an Orwellian COVID-1984 surveillance nightmare.

Drones, or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), have been increasingly employed in many limited and invaluable ways, including oil, gas, and mineral exploration; real estate, agriculture, and livestock surveying; infrastructure inspection; disaster relief; package delivery; improved cellular service; and filmmaking.

During the coronavirus pandemic, the NFL’s Atlanta Falcons flew drones to spray medical-grade disinfectant in their stadium’s seating areas after games. Law enforcement agencies have controlled drones with loudspeakers over parks and beaches to remind people of area closures or to socially distance. Drones have also delivered personal protective equipment, medical supplies, and medicines.

Those types of drone uses are perfectly reasonable, Scharf says. But when sensor- or camera-wielding drones stray from these innocuous tasks and violate a reasonable expectation of privacy, citizens should be concerned. Especially since robust regulations and laws about drones have yet to be written.

“To the extent that [drone operators] are not being thoughtful or careful about what they are recording and what they’re doing with the data—if [for example] they’re using facial-recognition technology, then selling it to the police to use it to solve different crimes— those are the types of things that need to be thought through,” Scharf says.

To that point, the city of Westport, Connecticut, proposed using thermal-recognition technology on drones to take and record people’s temperatures without their permission. Civil rights and privacy advocates such as Scharf argue such an act—obtaining the private health information of people who did not give consent and aren’t under a criminal investigation—would constitute an indiscriminate, warrantless search.

A well-established tort called intrusion into seclusion makes arresting and prosecuting a Peeping Tom armed with a camera perched

“There is something that seems different about having little flying machines going around recording all this information— when you think about it, they really are flying computers.”

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above your backyard wall relatively simple. But that same Peeping Tom flying a drone to capture images or video is much more complicated to prosecute. As a result, a sense of helplessness pervades: How do you capture a drone? How do you find out who owns the drone?

How do you prove the owner’s nefarious intent?

“There is something that seems different about having little flying machines going around recording all this information—when you think about it, they really are flying computers,” Scharf says. “People certainly don’t like the idea of [drones] being able to hover in their backyard and watch them. That makes them really angry.”

Scharf, who joined the Boyd School of Law’s faculty in 2004, suggests that more care and transparency about how data is collected and used can help ensure privacy—and avoid one element of Orwell’s dystopian nightmare. Toward that goal, she’s written articles such as “Game of Drones: Rolling the Dice with Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and Privacy” (2018) and “Drone Invasion: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and the Right to Privacy” (2019). Next year, she hopes to publish online her findings about drone use and privacy amid the pandemic.

FACULTY FOCUS

A Matter of Principle

“Enron was a company that we all looked up to until we realized what an incredible fraud it was. That shock to the system got me thinking: Why do smart people ... make big boneheaded mistakes?”

A FOREMOST AUTHORITY ON ETHICS AND THE LAW, PROFESSOR NANCY RAPOPORT TEACHES STUDENTS TO ALWAYS BE MINDFUL OF THEIR MORAL COMPASS

BY PAUL SZYDELKO As a professor and dean at the University of Houston Law Center two decades ago, Nancy Rapoport had a front-row seat for the Enron Corporation scandal and edited (and wrote parts of) three books focused on the Houston-based energy company’s collapse and other corporate fiascos.

What she learned from Enron, which she described as a good community partner that supported the arts and higher education, spurred more research that integrates social sciences where law intersects with business.

“Enron was a company that we all looked up to until we realized what an incredible fraud it was,” Rapoport says. “That shock to the system got me thinking: Why do smart people who have great credentials and a great education make big boneheaded mistakes?”

Now, as the Garman Turner Gordon Professor of Law at the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law and affiliate professor of business law and ethics at the UNLV Lee Business School, Rapoport is one of three authors of Ethical Lawyering: A Guide for the Well-Intentioned (Wolters Kluwer, 2021). The textbook focuses on the American Bar Association’s model rules of professional conduct, as well as hypotheticals in case law.

“Students need more practice understanding statutes and in working problems,” says Rapoport, who hopes the book’s irreverent tone captures her audience’s attention.

“Most people don’t go to law school to lie, cheat, and steal,” Rapoport adds. “So in the textbook, we focus on how good-natured people can get into trouble.”

In her seminars on corporate scandals, Rapoport frequently asks students to find and dig into newsworthy scandals. Playing roles of general counsel or CEO, students work backward to explore what might have changed the corporate dynamic and what could’ve been done to prevent the problem.

“I like mixing MBA students with law students because law students are taught to be very risk-averse,” Rapoport says. “In business, students are taught that the only way you make money is by taking risks. So it’s important for both sides to learn each other’s risk tolerances. The best way to do that is to work alongside each other in class.”

Through her research, Rapoport has discovered that corporate scandals can often be predicted by examining the ways in which humans tend to fool themselves. Among them: cognitive dissonance (people talking themselves into committing unethical acts bit by bit); diffusion of authority (not speaking up, assuming someone else will); anchoring (fixating on one factor to the exclusion of all others); and social/peer pressure (conforming to others’ behavior without realizing it).

Rapoport has gleaned additional knowl-

edge about ethics and the law through her work as a courtappointed expert and expert witness.

Often, bankruptcy courts ask Rapoport to weigh in on the topic of lawyer fees, with the goal of saving time and, ultimately, money that can be redirected back to creditors. She has reviewed fees in high-profile cases associated with notable companies such as Toys R Us, Caesars Entertainment, Station Casinos, and Zetta Jet. Besides traditional lectures and researching real-life scenarios, Rapoport also relies on Hollywood to teach her students about potential ethical pitfalls. An aficionado of playwright Aaron Sorkin, Rapoport rewatches all seven seasons of The West Wing every year. She also shows her students the classic comedy My Cousin Vinny, which depicts “a cornucopia of bad ethics.”

“The more my students can envision that they’re going to have to face these [ethical] challenges and the more they learn how to work through them, the better off they’re going to be when faced with a real crisis.”

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FACULTY FOCUS

FACULTY SCHOLARSHIP & ACCOMPLISHMENTS Ian C. Bartrum: The People’s

Court: On the Intellectual Origins of American Judicial Power, 125 Dickinson L. Rev. ___ (2020).

Frank Rudy Cooper: Cop Fragility and Blue Lives Matter, 2020 U. Illinois L. Rev. 621 (2020); Intersectional Cohorts, Dis/ability, and Class Actions, 47 Fordham Urban L. J. 293 (2020) (with Ann C. McGinley).

Ruben J. Garcia: The Human Right to Workplace Safety in a Pandemic, 64 Wash U. J of L. & Pol’y 1 (2020); Building Worker Collective Power Through Technology, 63 St. Louis Univ. L. J. ___ (2020).

Leslie C. Griffin: Filed amicus brief in the U.S. Supreme Court in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, regarding exclusion of same-sex couples from Catholic foster-care programs; Religion’s Wins Are Losses, SCOTUSBLOG (August, 2020).

Lori D. Johnson: Walk the Line: Aristotle and the Ethics of Narrative, 20 Nev. L. J. 1037 (2020) (with Melissa Love-Koenig); installed in January 2020 as Secretary of AALS Section on Legal Writing, Reasoning, and Research Michael Kagan: The Battle to Stay in America: Immigration’s Hidden Front Line (2020), reviewed in The New York Review of Books: “[Kagan] provides an unusually accessible primer on immigration law and a valuable guide to the ways it currently works to perpetuate an excluded immigrant underclass with diminished rights.”

Mary LaFrance: Public Art, Public Space and the Panorama Right, 55 Wake Forest L. Rev (2020).

Francine J. Lipman: Audited: Exposing Institutionalized Racism, Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Economics and Finance (Spring 2021); #BlackTaxpayersMatter: AntiRacist Restructuring of US Tax Systems, 46 Human Rights ___ (Winter 2020).

Ann C. McGinley: Feminist Judgments: Rewritten Employment Discrimination Cases (2020) (with Nicole Bounocore Porter); Feminist Perspectives 32

UNLV Law | 2020

Virtually Possible WHILE LEADING A CONCERTED EFFORT TO MOVE BOYD LAW SCHOOL INSTRUCTION ONLINE, PROFESSOR THOM MAIN DISCOVERS SOME UNEXPECTED BENEFITS

BY PAUL SZYDELKO Only a handful of professors at the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law had taught remotely before the COVID-19 pandemic made virtual classrooms not only more common but imperative.

The harried switch to online during the spring semester convinced faculty members to develop a more systematic approach in the fall. Enter Professor Thom Main, who chaired an eight-member committee that was organized to be a resource for the entire faculty.

The committee met weekly over Zoom and via email throughout the summer, ultimately determining that the best path forward was to limit the number of online platforms used while helping professors make the best choices for their own experience and their students’ needs. Main says it was important for each faculty member to understand technology’s constraints and opportunities, and come to terms with their own limitations and skills to deploy those tools.

“You might be ambitious for the sake of your students and want to take advantage of every conceivable thing out there,” says Main, who has been at Boyd Law School since 2012. “But if you’re not going to master it, you’re not going to be a good teacher.”

Main was inspired by how nimble his fellow professors were at the pandemic’s outset. “It still does give me goose bumps to realize how committed to the enterprise of teaching my colleagues are—‘Oh, teaching online?

Never done that before. But sure, I’ll be there Monday morning.’”

What’s even more impressive, he says, is the variety of techniques the faculty has embraced with a more deliberate approach. The virtual environment hasn’t neutralized the divergent personalities and distinct flavors of presentation. “[Professor] Joe Regalia’s at one extreme,” Main says.

“He’s never seen a piece of technology that he can’t put to immediate and great use.” Meanwhile, he says Professor John Valery White “has become more Socratic than ever,” creating an intimate virtual venue and asking critical questions of a limited number of students to draw out key ideas and promote understanding.

Main, who has never even delivered a PowerPoint presentation in class, admits he’s among the least technologically sophisticated among his peers (he surmises that’s likely why he was charged with leading the committee). But while he might be a tech novice, he says his

“A year ago, if you would have suggested to me that I’d be teaching online, I’d probably tear up—worrying about how my students will ever become the successful, ethical professionals that I want them to be if I’m teaching them online. I am now quite comfortable with the idea that some of this—a lot of this—really works.” long-simmering passion for podcasts has boiled over during the pandemic.

Hesitant to lecture extensively online, Main—who taught two sections of first-year civil procedure during the fall 2020 semester—has refined legal topics into tightly edited audio files. His students can listen when they want, which leaves more classroom time to discuss hypotheticals and real-world applications.

And those students won’t be Main’s only audience: The professor plans to post his podcast episodes— which feature interviews and lectures of varying levels of detail—on CivilProcedure.com, a domain name (along with CivilProcedure.org and CivilProcedure. net) he has owned for 25 years.

“A year ago, if you would have suggested to me that I’d be teaching online, I’d probably tear up—worrying about how my students will ever become the successful, ethical professionals that I want them to be if I’m teaching them online. I am now quite comfortable with the idea that some of this—a lot of this—really works.”

Main has no doubt that the transition to educating students online reflects what is happening in law practices and courtrooms. He also has no doubt there will be little turning back.

“This transition to an online environment, however artificial or contrived or forced it might be, is a quick look not at the future of legal practice but contemporary legal practice,” Main says. “There will be some going back. But when it comes to legal practice, there’s no way we’re going back to circa 2019.

“Even if we eliminate COVID, legal professionals are going to keep applying a lot of the online techniques that have proven to be surprisingly useful.”

FACULTY FOCUS

on Bostock v. Clayton County, Ga., Conn. L. Rev. Online (Dec. 2020).

Lydia Nussbaum: ADR, Dynamic (In)Justice, and Achieving Access: A Foreclosure Crisis Case Study, 88 Fordham L. Rev. 2337 (2020) Nancy B. Rapoport: The Legal Industry’s Second Chance to Get It Right, 57 Willamette L. Rev. ___ (2021)(with Joseph Tiano); Help Your Provost Help You During Promotion and Tenure Decisions, 23 Green Bag ___ (2020).

Joe Regalia: Recognized by Thomson Reuters as one of three “Top Law School Innovators” for bringing technology and human-centered approach into classrooms; invited as Visiting Professor at Peking University of Law in China.

Addie C. Rolnick: Strengthened Bonds: Abolishing the Child Welfare System and ReEnvisioning Child Well-Being, ___ Columbia Journal of Race and Law ___ (2020); Feminist Judgments: Criminal Law Judgments (Chapter re-writing State v. Williams) (2021).

Kathy M. Stanchi: Using Feminist Judgments in the Classroom, in Doctrine and Diversity: Inclusion and Equality in the Law School Classroom (Nicole Dyszlewski, ed. 2021); Feminist Judgments: Remaking the Law, One Decision at a Time, Presentation to the American Constitution Society (March 30, 2020).

Jeff Stempel: Snap Removal: Concept; Cause; Cacophony; and Cure, 73 Baylor L. Rev. ___ (2020) (with Thomas Main and David McClure); Adding Context to Corpus Linguistics, 85 Brook.

L. Rev. ___ (2020).

Jean Sternlight: Justice in a Brave New World?, 52 Conn.

L. Rev. 213 (2020), to be presented at Quinnipiac-Yale Dispute Resolution Workshop in 2021.

Anne Traum: Getting Past Younger Abstention, ___ Cornell Law Review ___ (2021).

Marketa Trimble: International Intellectual Property Law: Cases and Materials, (5th ed.

2019) (with Paul Goldstein); A Quarter Century of International Copyright on Software,

55 Texas Intn’l Law J. ___ (2020).

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FACULTY FOCUS

Breaking the Code PROFESSOR FRANCINE LIPMAN EXPLORES HOW THE NATION’S TAX SYSTEM IS EMBLEMATIC OF ITS VEXING RACISM—AND EXPLAINS WHY IT MUST CHANGE

BY PAUL SZYDELKO The story of our country can be told through myriad lenses—including, believe it or not, our tax system. Unfortunately, this particular story tells of longstanding injustice, as UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law Professor Francine Lipman documented in a recently published article exploring how our tax code is both a symptom and instrument of systemic racism.

Fractures in American society have been exposed this year through both the economic strain caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as police violence. Lipman calls these “tipping points that have put pressure on society such that racial, systemic, and institutional injustice has become front and center.

“Our tax systems are as old as our country, and our country was founded by slave owners,” says Lipman, who was the lead author of the article “U.S. Tax Systems Need Anti-Racist Restructuring,” which appeared in both Tax Notes Federal and Tax Notes State in August. “Embedded in the U.S. Constitution is the taxation with representation [clause] that counted Black individuals for these purposes as only three-fifths of a white person. Racism is institutionalized. It’s systemic. It’s entrenched in how we finance government and allocate resources. … We’re immersed in it, and we must step back to understand this isn’t the way it has to or should be.”

While U.S. tax laws do not explicitly mention race, Lipman contends they perpetuate and amplify many discriminatory practices that target vulnerable populations.

During her research of tax systems, Lipman reviewed income tax audit data and discovered the following: Of the top 10 U.S. counties that had the highest percentage of federal income tax audits in 2018, eight are in Mississippi, one is in Alabama, and another is in Louisiana. Collectively, Black citizens account for about 80 percent of the 34

UNLV Law | 2020

“Racism is institutionalized.

It’s systemic. It’s entrenched in how we finance government and allocate resources. ... We’re immersed in it, and we must step back to understand this isn’t the way it has to or should be.” population in those counties, which have very high poverty rates. By comparison, the 10 U.S. counties with the lowest audit rates are on average about 90 percent white.

“These facts demand further scrutiny to ensure our federal audit system is not part of the new Jim Crow,” Lipman said. “We’re criminalizing poverty, and similar to our justice system, it’s explicitly racist.”

She is hopeful that powerful thinkers will shine a light on the role taxes play in systemic racism. The country’s changing demographics also give her optimism. To

continue to stir change, she says it’s essential to educate children of the next generation and affirmatively be anti-racist.

Lipman blends the discipline of numbers, intellectual curiosity, and a sense of empathy to understand taxes on both a macro and micro level. “While it’s very ordered and pristine and methodical, it also has a human side,” she says. After all, tax forms tell the stories of individuals—their relationships with their partners, their dependents, and their financial well-being or distress.

As the only tax law professor at Nevada’s only law school, Lipman encourages her students to think about taxes more expansively.

Not only are they taxpayers themselves, but soon they will be working for businesses that pay taxes—and eventually, they may be in positions to rewrite our tax laws.

“The study of tax law is more animated than people, including my students, expect,” Lipman says. “I feel a great responsibility to open their minds to the way the tax system works and the way the tax system doesn’t work so that they can serve Nevadans more effectively.”

WHAT HAPPENS AT BOYD ... IN PICTURES

THE GALLERY

FORMER FBI DIRECTOR JAMES COMEY

On September 24, 2019, the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law welcomed former FBI Director James Comey for a conversation on leadership in conjunction with the school’s recently launched Law and Leadership Program.

2020 | UNLV Law

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WHAT HAPPENS AT BOYD ... IN PICTURES

THE GALLERY

LAW AND LEADERSHIP PROGRAM LAUNCH On September 12, 2019, the Boyd Law School launched its Law and Leadership Program under the direction of former Governor Brian Sandoval. It was an extraordinary day of learning from Nevada’s leaders and past chief executives of fellow western states, as well as leading members of the state and federal bench. Senator Nicole Cannizzaro, a UNLV Boyd Law alumna and the first female Senate Majority Leader in Nevada history, was honored with the inaugural Governor Brian Sandoval Award for Public Service (right).

Pictured from left: UNLV Boyd Law Distinguished Fellow and former Governor Brian Sandoval; former Governor and U.S. Senator Richard Bryan; former U.S. Senator Dean Heller; and UNLV Boyd Law Dean Dan Hamilton. Seated: Former U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

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THE GALLERY

SENATOR HARRY REID CIVIC DIALOGUE PROGRAM In partnership with former U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Distinguished Fellow in Law and Policy at the law school, UNLV Boyd Law has launched the “Senator Harry Reid Civic Dialogue Program.” This lecture series aims to bring panels of experts to Las Vegas to encourage important and timely conversations focused on racism in specific communities.

Top photo: On April 11, 2019, UNLV welcomed nationally recognized authors Dr. Deborah E. Lipstadt of Emory University (left), Jonathan Weisman of The New York Times (middle), and Reid (right) for a talk titled “Anti-Semitism in America.”

Bottom photo: On September 26, 2019, the law school hosted “Islam in America,” a discussion with legal, social justice, immigration, and foreign-policy experts examining the historical and modern-day experiences of Muslims in the United States. Pictured from left: Farhana Khera, president and executive director of Muslim Advocates; Michael Kagan, UNLV Joyce Mack Professor of Law and director of the UNLV Immigration Clinic; Farid Senzai, professor of Political Science at Santa Clara University and founder of the Center for Global Policy; Mahir Hussein, president of UNLV Muslim Student Association; Sahar Aziz, Professor of Law and Chancellor’s Social Justice Scholar at Rutgers University Law School; and Leila Fadel, National Public Radio National Correspondent.

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KEEPING UP WITH BOYD ALUMNI

CLASS ACTIONS

2001 Leon Symanski was appointed as arbitrator as part of the Nevada Court Annexed Arbitration Program.

2002 Cory A. Santos Sr. was granted a ring official’s license by the Nevada State Athletic Commission to judge professional boxing matches in Nevada. Santos has been a boxing judge since 2011 and has judged eight title fights and one title eliminator. He is also licensed as a judge in Texas, Utah, and by the World Boxing Council.

2005 T. Blake Gross opened a sole practice, the Law Office of Blake Gross in Ashland, Wisc., in April.

2006 Evangelin Lee joined McKinsey & Company’s legal department as associate general counsel. She is the lead attorney for the firm on aerospace and defense matters.

2007 Maricar “Rica” Magana Andrade and her, husband Giovanni Andrade, established their own law firm, Andrade Law, after graduation. Their practice has been devoted to divorce, custody, child support, and paternity matters. Three years after receiving her law degree, she cofounded the nonprofit Bamboo Bridges. The mission of the Southern Nevadabased organization is to offer culturally relevant services to the Asian Pacific American community, with a focus on domestic violence/sexual assault advocacy services, an annual high school leadership symposium, and coalition building.

2008 Peter E. Dunkley joined the Lipson Neilson law firm in 38

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Vaulting into Action FORMER OLYMPIC GYMNAST TASHA SCHWIKERT USES HER BOYD LAW SCHOOL DEGREE TO POSITIVELY IMPACT FEMALE ATHLETES

BY LISA JACOB As an elite gymnast, Tasha Schwikert’s discipline and training helped her earn numerous national titles and medals. Just as importantly, Schwikert’s experience and determination fueled her advocacy for female athletes and propelled the launch of her law career.

The Las Vegas native was 15 years old when she was a member of the bronze-winning U.S. women’s gymnastics team at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney. Four years later, she accepted a scholarship to UCLA, where she won two NCAA all-around national championships (2005 and 2008), and where she graduated with a sociology degree in 2009.

Schwikert then accepted a position with a sports management agency, assisting with contract negotiations, sponsorship, and marketing deals for female Olympic athletes. But when it was time for the in-house attorneys to draw up legal agreements for her clients, the process often stalled as they focused mostly on the NBA and Major League Baseball players the firm represented.

“I felt like sometimes my contracts would get put on the bottom of the pile because there were bigger deals to be done,” Schwikert recalls. “I loved helping these women, but I felt like without a law degree, there was only so much I could do. That was the moment where I was like, ‘I need to go to law school and get a law degree so I don’t have to wait on someone else

A member of the U.S. women’s gymnastics team that won a bronze medal at the 2000 Olympics, Tasha Schwikert now advocates for athletes in her role as an associate with the Dallas law firm Munck Wilson Mandala.

CLASS ACTIONS

to get this stuff done.’”

After two years with the sports management agency, Schwikert went after that law degree.

Choosing to attend the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law was easy: She wanted to be near her family, and her initial desire was to practice law in her hometown. What made her slightly uneasy was the three-year gap in her education, not to mention an anticipated age gap between her and other first-year Boyd Law School students.

That uneasy feeling dissipated shortly after Schwikert arrived on campus.

“It was nice to see that Boyd had a diverse class of students from all age ranges, people who were my age or had some real-life work experience prior to law school,” Schwikert says. “Many already had careers, and law was their second career.

I was able to relate to a lot of my classmates.”

One area where Schwikert had a leg up was understanding and accepting the reality that earning a law degree required intense focus and discipline. The onetime elite athlete drew upon her many years of gymnastics training—almost eight hours a day, six days a week—to confront the rigors of law school.

“Once you start [law school], you have to make it your main focus,” Schwikert says. “There were times when I was in the library studying for hours or in class not wanting to read any more cases, or times when I was simply stressed out. But I had to keep pushing, because giving up wasn’t an option.”

Schwikert completed her J.D. in 2015, and in 2019 she moved to Dallas, where she is now an associate at Munck Wilson Mandala’s

corporate section, specializing in mergers and acquisitions, real estate, and construction. While her gymnastics training helped prepare her for law school, it was law school that prepared her for another challenge—one that was immensely personal.

Passionate about advocating for institutional change within USA Gymnastics and the United States Olympic Committee, Schwikert became co-chair of a special committee that represented more than 500 female athletes who were sexually assaulted by former USA Gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar.

She and her sister are among those survivors.

Schwikert was one of three former U.S. gymnasts to testify before Texas’ Senate Committee on

State Affairs in May 2019 to support a bill to give child sex abuse victims more time to sue organizations that failed to protect them. The bill passed unanimously in both houses and was signed into law a month later.

“I drew from my gymnastics experiences during that testimony, but being a lawyer really helped calm me because [the situation] was intimidating and a bit nerve-racking,” Schwikert says. “But being an attorney, I was able to stay on task and get my point across clearly. All the writing and presentation tasks and oral argument exercises that I had to do [at the Boyd School of Law] helped me feel calm and confident. I was ready to be impactful and tell my story.”

Building upon her work as an advocate for athletes, Schwikert is now leading Munck Wilson Mandala’s first-ever sports law division. While her legal career and roles as a wife (she’s married to former UNLV basketball player and current Dallas Mavericks player development coach Mike Moser) and mother of two young children command a great deal of her time, Schwikert says she remains committed to helping athletes who are victims of sexual abuse.

“I hope I can do more to make sure athletes are protected, and make gymnastics safer—all sports safer, really. But obviously gymnastics is at the core of my being. It was my entire life.”

its Reno office. Dunkley’s practice focuses primarily on the areas of homeowner and community associations, directors and officers, professional liability, insurance defense, commercial litigation, and real estate law.

2012 Tim Mott, ’12 J.D., and Mike Valiente, ’16 J.D., opened the Valiente Mott Injury Attorneys law firm on March 1, 2018.

2013 Marisa Rodriguez moved to North Las Vegas as a senior deputy city attorney.

2014 Brittnie T. Watkins was elected representative on the State Bar of Nevada Board of Governors. She is the first African American woman elected as a governor in the bar’s almost 100-year history.

2015 Tanya M. Fraser is launching a legal estate planning practice, Tanya Fraser Law, serving clients in Florida and Nevada.

Crislove Igeleke was named Pro Bono Attorney of the Year

by Nevada Legal Services at its Champions of Justice Awards, along with Justice Michael Douglas, who also was honored. Igeleke is the founding director and treasurer on the board of TEACH Las Vegas Charter School, which is scheduled to open in fall 2021, and currently serves as chair of the Community Outreach and Voter Initiatives Committee for the Las Vegas National Bar Association.

2016 Timothy E. Revero, ’16 J.D., and Michael McAvoyAmaya, ’15 J.D., started their own firm, McAvoy Amaya & Revero, Attorneys.

2020 | UNLV Law

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CLASS ACTIONS

2020 TOP LAWYERS

Congratulations to the following Boyd School of Law alumni for being named to Vegas INC’s 2020 Top Lawyers list: Peter Ajemian (’05), Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck Heather Armantrout (’17), Lewis Brisbois Adam Bult (’04), Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck Matthew Cecil (’05), Holland & Hart Richard Chatwin (’07), Gerrard Cox Larsen Shane D. Cox (’15), The Powell Law Firm Nicholas D. Crosby (’04), Marquis Aurbach Coffing Cary B. Domina (’07), Peel Brimley LLP Riana Durrett (’08), Riana Durrett PLLC Maximilien Fetaz (’11), Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck Russel J. Geist (’04), Hutchison & Steffen PLLC Nedda Ghandi (’08), Ghandi Deeter Blackham Charles Gianelloni (’12), Snell & Wilmer LLP Erin E. Grolle (’08), Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck Dennis Gutwald (’03), McDonald Carano LLP Lawrence C. Hill (’09), Lawrence C. Hill & Associates Brooke A. Holmes (’16), Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck Dustun Holmes (’12), Pisanelli Bice Jennifer Isso (’13), Isso & Hughes Law Firm Jeremy Kilber (’07), Weil & Drage Frank A. Leavitt (’15), Leavitt Law Firm Seth Little (’07), The Little Law Group

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Analyze This A WILLINGNESS TO ADAPT LED ANALYTICS EXPERT JEREMY AGUERO TO ALTER HIS CAREER PATH AND PURSUE A BOYD LAW DEGREE THAT HAS PROVEN INVALUABLE

BY LISA JACOB Jeremy Aguero has some simple words of advice for prospective students of the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law: Be flexible. A 2004 graduate of the law school, Aguero speaks from experience, as his own educational journey was a study in flexibility.

As an undergraduate in what was then known as the UNLV William F. Harrah College of Hotel Administration, Aguero says his future took a fortuitous turn when he met Shannon Bybee. The renowned gaming attorney and gaming and law professor recognized Aguero’s talent for analytics and helped him curate a curriculum that Aguero says developed the skills he needed to become successful in his field.

“I took a fair amount of independent study, classes in economics and finance that wouldn’t necessarily have been part of the core curriculum for a Hotel Administration major,” Aguero says.

“That was remarkably helpful for me, and I am indebted to [Bybee] for that.”

Aguero’s agility certainly paid off. During his final year of undergraduate studies, he served as an intern/analyst with Coopers and Lybrand’s (now PricewaterhouseCoopers) Financial Advisory Services group. After graduating with honors in 1997, Aguero launched Applied Analysis, a Las Vegas-based economic and fiscal policy consultancy.

Aguero was a couple of years into building his startup when

Bybee hit him with another challenge: Get yourself a law degree.

“He sat me down and said, ‘You know I’ve helped you get this far; this is what you need to do next. I want you to promise me that you will go to law school,’” Aguero says of his mentor, who died in 2003. “So I went to law school to fulfill that promise.”

Taking flexibility to a new level, Aguero attended law classes in the evening while he ran Applied Analysis and began raising a family. Additionally, Aguero was selected to chair former Governor Kenny Guinn’s Task Force on Tax Policy Technical Working Group (2001-02) and serve as its principal analyst. He coauthored its 1,200page report, which has been called the most comprehensive study of Nevada’s fiscal system in the state’s history.

Over the years, Applied Analysis has represented a broad range of public- and private-sector clients and industries, including mining, tourism, education, transportation, local and state governments, and gaming. With an expertise in economic analysis, operational model development, and fiscal impact analysis, Aguero’s work has been influential in several significant Silver State projects, including the development of the commerce tax in support of former Governor Brian Sandoval’s Education Reform Bill, the expansion of the Las Vegas Convention Center, and the construction of Allegiant Stadium.

He credits his law school professors for helping him grasp how analytics and the law integrate

(and why that integration is important from a business perspective).

Aguero has used that knowledge to help his clients improve their bottom line, which in turn has made Applied Analysis successful.

“Law school was arguably the most important experience that I had relative to what I do for a living today,” Aguero says. “Shannon Bybee knew that I was pretty comfortable with the mathematics, but my ability to understand not only the law but how things become law is critical to everything I do, whether it’s working with state or local governments or working with private sector industries relative to public policies.

“The legal side of our business is very important and has developed principally because of my education at the Boyd School of Law.” As his business has flourished, Aguero has remained engaged with his alma mater. Besides serving as a Greenspun Distinguished Professor of Practice, he was honored as the 2011 Boyd School of Law Alumnus of the Year and the 2018 UNLV Alumni Association’s Fred C. Albrecht Outstanding Alumnus. Aguero remains grateful to the many UNLV professors who influenced his education and is eager to pass along the lessons he learned to current and aspiring students.

“The greatest skill set that Boyd offers is the ability to think. And in today’s world—particularly today’s business world—the ability to be flexible is arguably the most important asset that any graduate can have,” he says. “The Boyd School of Law prepared me in that way. If [students] do their part, if they meet their professors halfway and are receptive to their advice, it will serve them remarkably well in their careers.”

CLASS ACTIONS

Bryce Loveland (’06), Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck Joel M. Mann (’02), Law Office of Joel M. Mann Matthew McKissick (’19), Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck Jennifer Micheli (’08), Marquis Aurbach Coffing Terry A. Moore (’01), Marquis Aurbach Coffing

“The greatest skill set that Boyd offers is the ability to think.

And in today’s world—particularly today’s business world—the ability to be flexible is arguably the most important asset that any graduate can have. The Boyd School of Law prepared me in that way.”

Linda Norcross (’04), Aristocrat Technologies Inc Steven Parke (’10), The Parke Law Firm Yasnai C. RodriguezZaman (’17), The Dickerson Karaconyi Law Group Sagar R. Raich (’13), Raich Law PLLC Karl Rutledge (’06), Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie LLP Robert H. Sidell (’16), Sidell Injury Law Ashley Sisolak (’13), Clark County Public Defender Office Mark Starr (’17), Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck Kelsey Stegall (’16), Littler Mendelson PC Michael Trippiedi (’15), Zaman & Trippiedi PLLC James A. Trummell (’15), Eglet Adams Nicholas G. Vaskov (’02), City of Henderson Melissa Waite (’07), Dickinson Wright Eric Walther (’14), Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck Mackenzie Warren (’17), McDonald Carano LLP Jason H. Weinstock (’18), Law Office of Jason H Weinstock PLLC Kathleen Wilde (’11), Marquis Aurbach Coffing Lindsey A. Williams (’14), Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck Waleed Zaman (’15), Zaman & Trippiedi PLLC

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RECOGNIZING BOYD’S SUPPORTERS

DONORS

Betting on the Future A HISTORIC DONATION FROM THE SAN MANUEL BAND OF MISSION INDIANS TO THE BOYD SCHOOL OF LAW STRIVES TO INCREASE UNDERSTANDING, PROMOTE EDUCATION ABOUT TRIBAL GAMING

BY PAUL SZYDELKO Misconceptions about Indian gaming persist decades after the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988, so educating players on casino floors—and even industry executives—was one of the primary motivations for the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians to offer a $9 million gift to UNLV earlier this year.

Among the misunderstandings: Indian gaming and commercial gaming are the same. Commercial gaming, in fact, is a profit-making enterprise for the benefit of casino owners. Conversely, Indian gaming—more accurately called “tribal government gaming”—generates revenue for essential infrastructure and services in a tribe’s jurisdiction, such as education, health care, public safety, law enforcement, and other common obligations that towns, 42

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cities, and states across the country provide for their citizens.

The $9 million gift is being shared by the UNLV William F. Harrah College of Hospitality ($6 million) and the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law ($3 million) to develop and promote education, research, and awareness as it relates to tribal hotel-casinos. The Boyd School of Law’s portion will be used to support a professor-in-residence, a visiting professor, and a program administrator who will create opportunities for interdisciplinary dialogue and research on governance, regulation, and economic development issues facing Indian gaming.

“Education is the only prescription for building understanding between Indian tribes and others about the uniqueness of tribal government gaming,” says Ken Ramirez, San Manuel tribal chairman. “The Native American Law and Governance initiative at the Boyd School of Law will help build that understanding.”

The California-based tribe not only seeks to inform others about gaming on Indian lands but also to establish education as a foundational value going forward, Ramirez says.

“Our top priority is to provide quality educational opportunities for our citizens that will enable them to lead successful and pro-

ductive lives,” Ramirez says. “Our path in the world depends on factual understanding and respectful interactions with other jurisdictions, other businesses, and other communities. … It is in the best interests of Indian country to extend to others educational opportunities about tribal governments and tribal gaming.”

Funds from the gift will help form a scholarship for students pursuing a Masters of Law (LL.M.) in gaming law and regulation at the Boyd School of Law, the only law school in the nation to offer such a degree. Preference is given to tribal citizens and indigenous student applicants. The first scholarship was awarded recently to Patrick Lambert from the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians in North Carolina, who served as executive director for the Cherokee Gaming Commission for 21 years.

The law school will also develop online courses on tribal governance and gaming regulation, conduct an annual workshop or symposium on emerging topics and issues of interest to Indian gaming, and expand its Tribal Law Practicum for students.

The practicum is a yearlong, projectbased course in which students partner with tribal nations on projects that strengthen Native American governance. It provides free or low-cost help to tribal nations looking to strengthen their legal and regulatory infrastructure; gives law students experience working with tribal governments; and creates opportunities for students to develop skills in governance, drafting laws, legal research, and client interaction.

Even before awarding the generous gift, the San Manuel Band has maintained a seat on the law school’s Gaming Law Advisory Council for more than a decade. It also has contributed to a biennial Boyd Law course in federal gaming law by attracting nationally renowned speakers in tribal gaming.

“We met several cohorts of law students, some of whom have expressed appreciation for the chance to learn about tribal government gaming as a part of their studies,” Ramirez says.

The gift is the largest out-of-state philanthropic donation that San Manuel has bestowed on an educational or health-care institution. Given Boyd Law’s worldwide reputation as a leading expert in gaming law, Ramirez says the partnership was a nobrainer. “We believe it is a great benefit to all of Indian country for the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law to add tribal gaming law, regulation, and tribal governance to its existing programs.”

DONORS

Working It Out

LOCAL LAW FIRM SAM & ASH ESTABLISHES SCHOLARSHIP TO ASSIST STUDENTS WHO HAVE WORKPLACE EXPERIENCE

BY PAUL SZYDELKO When local personal injury attorneys Sam Mirejovsky and Ashley Watkins decided to create a series of renewable scholarships at the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law, they knew they wanted to help students who had their educational timeline disrupted.

That’s why any student who applies for the Sam & Ash Scholarship must meet one key requirement: They had to have worked professionally for at least one year before beginning their law school journey.

That prerequisite is important to Mirejovsky and Watkins because they know the challenges that often accompany interrupting the momentum of schooling. Both took time off between their undergraduate years and their legal education at the Fowler School of Law at Chapman University in Orange, California, where they met.

Together, Mirejovsky and Watkins have donated $25,000 this year to the Boyd School of Law to support five $5,000 scholarships that recipients can renew for two additional years. By the 2022-23 academic year, their commitment will grow to as much as $75,000 annually, with as many as 15 students—five 1Ls, five 2Ls, and five 3Ls—each receiving $5,000.

“The objective is to reduce barriers for people who maybe are already in the workforce, but they really see their passion in the legal field,” Watkins says. “We want to help provide the financial assistance so those students can pursue their dreams and not be completely burdened.”

She notes that students who have already started their careers—and particularly those with families to support—have a steeper mountain of lectures, casebooks, and exams to navigate. Helping such students make that climb not only is rewarding, but also good for the law school and the profession.

“People who have had some real-world experience make for very good law students and [even] better lawyers because they’re looking at everything with a little bit more real-world knowledge than students who have gone from K-12 to four years of undergrad and then right into law school,” Mirejovsky says.

He’s found that graduates who have already earned a paycheck also are more likely to ascend the legal ranks quickly. Mirejovsky recalls an insurance adjuster who gained his law degree and was picked quickly for a partner-track job at a respected firm because he already had insurance experience.

Although they both attended law school in Southern California, Mirejovsky and Watkins quickly connected with the Las Vegas legal community before establishing Sam & Ash in downtown Las Vegas in 2019. That includes taking their Nevada Bar exams at UNLV, as

well as meeting and quickly bonding with Boyd Law School Dean Dan Hamilton.

“Dan has been incredibly supportive of Ashley and me and our firm,” Mirejovsky says. “We immediately felt like we had a connection with the school because we have this friend, and whenever we met, Dan would talk about all the different things he was planning and what direction the school was going in.”

Watkins points to another commonality that helped them forge an undeniable bond with the law school: the youthfulness of the two law partners and the school (which was founded in 1998).

“It’s a young institution. [Its] story resonates with what Sam and I are trying to accomplish,” she says. “We’re younger, and we’ve got a lot to prove. That requires our firm and our staff to be much more innovative, collaborative, and cutting edge. When I look at what we’re trying to do and I look at [Boyd’s] students and faculty, it just aligns.”

Mirejovsky, who jokes that he’s a “recovering Californian,” grew up in and still loves the Golden State. But now that he and Watkins have made Las Vegas their home, they’re committed to going all in to help Nevada’s only law school and its students, with the ultimate goal of enhancing the profession and the community.

“This is home base for us now,” Mirejovsky says. “As we grow our business, it’s very important to me to give back. You’re only as wealthy in life proportional to what you’re giving back to your community, and we intend to grow our commitment to UNLV as we become more successful as a firm.”

2020 | UNLV Law

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RECOGNIZING BOYD’S SUPPORTERS

• *indicates Alumni Leadership Circle member • + indicates UNLV Boyd Law School faculty and staff

DONORS

The law school is grateful to the following donors for their support in Fiscal Year 2020 (July 1, 2019-June 30, 2020).

$1,000,000+

• William S. Boyd & The Boyd Foundation • Samuel and Lexy Lionel & The Lionel Trust

• +Gov. Brian Sandoval and Lauralyn Sandoval • Kim Sinatra & the Kim Marie Sinatra Charitable Fund • Southern Nevada Association of Women Attorneys

$5,000.00-$9,999

• Chantal and Stephen Cloobeck • Lynn and Foster Friess • GVC Foundation U.S. • National Christian Foundation

• Allegiant Air • +Mary Beth Beazley • +Stewart Chang and Paul Mata • Ifrah Law • Barbara Buckley and Thomas Kendrick • KJS Family Foundation • The Honorable Philip and Dori Pro • Searchlight Leadership Fund • Keith and Jeanne Smith • Southwest Gas Corporation Foundation • John Wanderer • Ernest Zacher

$100,000-$249,999

$2,500-$4,999

$500,000-$999,999 • San Manuel Band of Mission Indians

$250,000-$499,999

• Goldman Sachs Philanthropy Fund • Ed and Claudia Bernstein & Edward M. Bernstein & Associates

$50,000-$99,999

• Norman Brownstein & Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, LLP • +Daniel W. Hamilton and Mary-Ann Winkelmes • Joyce Mack • Dr. James Nave • Ed Rosenblum and Anne Mazzola & the Rosenblum Family Foundation • Leslie and Tom Thomas & the Thomas & Mack Company • Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program • Wilkes & McHugh, P.A.

$25,000-$49,999

• The E. L. Cord Foundation • Robert and Tracy Eglet & Eglet Adams • Tom and Mary Gallagher & the Thomas E. & Mary K. Gallagher Foundation • Garman Turner Gordon, LLP • Yvonne and Gerald Gordon • Fred Nassiri • NV Energy • Jeffrey Rodefer & the Gaming Law Section of the Nevada State Bar • Michael and Sonja Saltman • Sam & Ash, LLP • State Bar of Nevada • Mark and Sandra Tratos • UNLV Boyd Law Alumni Association

$10,000-$24,999 • Lynnda Brown ’04 • Sharyn and Jay Brown • Louella and Sean Claggett ’03 • Covington & Burling LLP • Fidelity Charitable Gift Fund • Brian and Myra Greenspun • Harris and Eliza Kempner Fund • Paul Harry • Hasso Philanthropic Foundation • Lori Kalani • John O’Reilly • +Sen. Harry Reid and Landra Reid 44

UNLV Law | 2020

• Erik Covarrubias • Dickinson Wright, PLLC • *Daron Dorsey ’01 and Hon. Jennifer Dorsey • Duane Morris LLP • Fennemore Craig, P.C. • Jacinta Fitzgerald • GeoComply USA, Inc. • Samantha Goett • Elyse Gresnick-Smith ’13 • Hartwell Thalacker, Ltd • Howard & Howard Attorneys, PLLC • Larson Skinner PLLC • Gregory and Dana Lee • Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie, LLP • Cindy and Rory Reid • Reid Rubinstein & Bogatz • Patrick N. Chapin, LTD. • The Schwab Fund for Charitable Giving • +Nancy Rapoport and Jeffrey Van Niel

$1,000-$2,499

• Richard Andrews ’13 • *Paola Armeni Androvandi ’03 and Joe Androvandi • Association of Administrative Law Judges • Association of Gaming Equipment Manufacturers • Christian Augustin ’15 • Larry and Rochelle Berkley • +Bret Birdsong and Anne Traum • Dana Blackhurst and Janis Jones Blackhurst • Jean and Fergus Bordewich • *Ogonna Brown ’01 • +Anthony and Linda Cabot • *Justin Carley ’06 and Anna Carley • Patrick Chapin • *Holly Cheong ’10 and Angelo Cheong • Sabrena and Uri Clinton • +John Valery White and Jocelyn Cortez • Alex and Catherine De Castroverde & the De Castroverde Law Group • *Kelly Dove ’07 and Ian Dove • *Charles Gianelloni ’12 and Jae Gianelloni • Steven Wolfson and Jacalyn Glass • Joan Hammer and James Hammer • *Kara Hendricks ’01 and *Jean-Paul Hendricks ’06 • Nicholas Hickly ’12 • Kirk Homeyer ’11

• +Michael Kagan • Kemp, Jones & Coulthard, LLP • Karen Kretchmar • Las Vegas Raiders • Peggy Leen • *Kfir Levy ’03 and Anne Marie Levy ’01 • Roberta Martin • Kevin McFadden • +Ann McGinley and Jeffrey Stempel • Samuel and Mary-Ellen McMullen • Matthew Morris ’13 • *Jessica Murphy ’03 and *James Murphy ’03 • National Associaton of Corp Dir’s Inc So California Chap • New York New York Hotel & Casino • *Michael Paretti ’15 • Marsha Peterson ’07 • +Ngai Pindell • *Robert Potter ’02 • *Rosa Solis-Rainey ’01 and Dayne Rainey • +Christine Smith • Raymond Smith ’03 • Snell & Wilmer, LLP • The Honorable Lidia Stiglich • *Cassie Stratford ’08 • Lisa Symanski & Leon Symanski ’01 • *Melissa Waite ’ 07 and Kendall Thacker • The Law Office of Rodolfo Gonzalez, Ltd. • UpRight Law • Valley Health System • Andrea Waite & Dan Waite • *Trevor Waite ’14 and Tara Waite • *Ann Ward ’02 • William Hill • Wynn Resorts • Renée and Michael Yackira • Youth Charities of Southern Nevada

$500-$999

• Allegiant Travel Company • Arthur Murray Dance Studio • Ballard Spahr, LLP • James Baldwin • +Ian Bartrum • Nancy Bernstein ’04 • *Brian Blaylock ’12 and Anne Blaylock • Bonnie Bulla • *Joe Cain ’01 and Christina Cain • Lewis Fanger • John Farahi • Friends For Harry Reid • Patricia and Charles Ford • Staci and Randy Garcia • GBS Nevada Partners, LLC • Carmen Gilbert ’19 • Health Plan of Nevada • Megan and Justin Jones • Las Vegas Motor Speedway • Law Office of Erik Severino • +Jean Sternlight and Sylvia Lazos • Ronnie and Patricia Lee • Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada • +Thomas and Paula Main • Maupin, Cox & Legoy • Jason Miller ’18 • Christina and Richard Morgan • *Sandra Douglass Morgan ’03 and Don Morgan • Nana Sandy LLC

DONORS

• Nevada Legal News • Nevada Resort Association • +David Orentlicher • Douglas and Christina Pyatt • Mayra Salinas-Menjivar ’17 • Nicole Scott ’14 • Karen Severino ’06 and Erik Severino ’06 • South Point Hotel & Casino • Stetson University College of Law • Glen Stevens • Kathleen Tam • The Coder School • Joseph Tomczyk • +Marketa Trimble Landova and Gary Trimble Landova • Jake Trower • V Theatre Group • Valerie Wiener • Frank Woodbeck

• +Keith and Katherine Rowley • Royal Links Golf Club • Rafael and Jennifer Sanchez • Paul Schulman • Kathy and Michael Shalmy ’06 • The Smith Center • Katia Spataro ’01 • Stallion Mountain Golf Club • Michael Stein • Gloria Sturman • Robert Telles ’14 • Dawn Hathaway Thoman ’14 and A. Randall Thoman • Cindy Villanueva • Janet and Austin Wand • Brandon Wiegand • Jennifer Yee

$250-$499

• Cheryl Abramoff • Enrique Acuna • Joseph Adamiak • Danae Adams • Aliante Gaming LLC • David Thomas and Nancy Allf • Chelsea Armstrong • Astor Chocolate • Anthony Baker • Barre 3 • Bedouin Events • Kayla Boyatt • Elyse Brown • Cafe Lola • Carolina Chacon • CKO Kickboxing • Clark County Museum • Clark Hill • Alissa Cooley ’14 • Melissa Corral ’14 • Robert and Julia Correales • Valerie Cossio • Charles Cowan • Carmen De La Cruz • Tony and Michelle Di Silvestro Alanis ’06 • Angela Doran • +Frank and Veronica Durand • Ethel M Chocolates • Frances-Ann Fine • Craig and Sally Galati ’05 • Cara Gamiero ’19 • Homero Gonzalez ’19 • Ben and Elana Graham • +Leslie Griffin • Arun Gupta ’08 • Siria Gutierrez ’10 • *Lilth Xara ’13 and Abigail Habdas ’16 • +Becky Harris ’16 • Derek Hatch • Julia Hayton • Craig Hendricks • Romero Hidalgo • Keith Hightower ’17 • +Lori Johnson • Karla Irwin • Robb Jones ’10 • Romeo and Nadia Jurani ’03 • +Kay Kindred • Brandie Kircher ’05 and Christopher Kircher ’08

• Khaled Aboulaiha • +Rachael Adair and Luther Adair • Adventure Combat Ops • Vince Alberta • Joanna Kishner and David Alexander • Jacqueline Alvarez • Art by Mandy Joy • Vivi and Richard Baldwin • Shan Bates • Canyon Ranch • Gladys and Steve Comer • Kathleen Delaney • Valerie Diaz • Alec Driscoll • Robert Eash • Robert Eisenberg • Esther’s Kitchen • John Falb • John Flanagan • Ford & Friedman, LLC • Elizabeth Fretwell • Ozzie and Ellen Fumo • Marta Meana and Timothy Gauthier • Juan Giron • GOLFTEC Henderson • Oscar and Carolyn Goodman • Joseph and Kimberly Goodnight ’06 • Christopher Horner ’08 • Myke Hottenstein • International Market Centers • Bruce Leslie • Raquel Lopez • Rosa and Victor Lucero • LV Criminal Defense • Scott MacTaggart • Cliff Marcek • Juan Martinez • Patricia McGill • Joshua McGinn • Roger Moffitt • Laura Overton • Adrienn and Anthony Pearl • Sally Pera • Production Specialists Inc • Shannon Raborn • REO Speedwagon Inc • Marisa Rodriguez ’13

$100-$249

• Marianne Lagarias • Las Vegas Lights FC • Law Office of Sylvia L. Esparza • Brittany Llewellyn ’14 • Lost Games Escape Rooms • Emily Lown • LunchboxWax • Lynda Sue Mabry • Briana Martinez ’18 • Joel Martinez • Celina Mason • Alisa McAffee • +Thomas McAffee • McDonald Carano Wilson, LLP • Kegan McMullan ’16 • Chad and Christine Miller • John Mowbray ’17 • Jacob Narotzky • Brad Neumann • Stacy Newman ’16 • John Piro ’10 and Leslie Nino-Piro ’09 • Matthew and Linda Norcross ’04 • +Lydia Nussbaum • Mary Jo Nyitrai ’18 • Pasta Shop Ristorante & Art Gallery • Sarah Perez ’11 • Reid and Jessica Perlick ’13 • Karlee Phelps ’11 • Pinot’s Palette • Regi Kunnel & Radhika Pochampally-Kunnel • Chandler Pohl ’14 • William Price • Heather Procter ’03 • Richard Rawson ’04 • Francesca Resch ’12 • Samantha Reviglio ’16 • Sharon Rigby ’06 • Mariteresa Rivera-Rogers ’03 • Casey Rosenberg ’17 • Ruby Mountains Helicopter • Mark Sakurada ’14 • David Sandino • Tick Segerblom • Cristina Silva • Kara Spoelstra • +Frank Fritz and +Kathy Stanchi • State 36 Clothing Co. • Stacy Strobel • Angie Sullivan ’06 • Greer Sullivan • Ashley Sutherland ’17 • Despina Hatton & John Swendseid • Charles Tabesh • Table 26 Productions • +David and Virginia Tanenhaus • Jose Valenzuela ’11 • Vegenation • Velveteen Rabbit • Sharon Walker • Eric Watson • *Hon. Brenda Weksler ’02 • Marcy and Gerald Welt • Western Folklife Center • Christine Whitmire • Nolan Jones and Cayla Witty ’12 • Xventure LV LLC • Shane Young ’04 2020 | UNLV Law

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DONORS

$1-$99

• Kimberly Abbott • Claudia Aguayo • AMC Theatres-Rainbow Promenade • Maricar Andrade ’07 and Giovanni Andrade ’07 • Gabrielle Angle ’10 • Dallas Anselmo • Madeline Arcellana ’15 • Laurents Banuelos-Benitez • Susan Barrera • Sarah Barson • Catherine Bascle • Dominika Batten ’10 • Leonardo Benavides ’18 • Zach Besso • William and Kelly Boan • Roman Borisov ’12 • Sydney Brannon ’18 • Paula Braun • Michael Pawlak & Barbara Brents • Cameron Brown • Emily Buchwald ’14 • Stevie Burger • Arthur Burns • Raul Campillo ’11 • Charles Cano • Elizabeth Capstick • Jennifer Carr ’06 • Shanna Carter • Michael Chang ’19 • David Chavez ’19 • Christine Clancy • Jessica and Timothy Clausen ’06 • Gavin Clough • Malcolm Cohen • Caitlin Conroy • Deonne Contine ’05 and Benjamin Contine ’05 • Joseph Dagher ’19 • Elizabeth Davenport • Lillian Davenport • Nathan Davenport ’18 • Christian Dejesus • Kyle DeSormier • Desra Dickerson • Adele Doctor • Jordan Doctors ’18 • Steven and Tiffany Doctors ’16 • Angela Dows ’06 • Derek Drake ’09 • Dillon Dugan • Hugh Eckert • Leslie Espinoza • Christine Fekixon • Randolph Fiedler • Shawn Flaherty • Augustine Flores • Lynda and Richard Foster ’19 • Tami Gadd-Willardson ’09 • Michelle Gaines • John and Linda Gannon ’08 • Nina Garcia ’17 • Alexis Gilreath • Michael Gobaud ’14 • Cheryl Grames ’12 • Amanda Grathwohl 46

UNLV Law | 2020

• Margaret and Yuri Graves • Groom Room • Hillary and Jeffrey Hall ’05 • +Sunny and Edward Halstead • Doreen Hartwell • Michael Hegwood • Kyle Helton • Daniel and Raquel Heraldez • Monserrath Hernandez ’18 • Matthew Hersh • Egan Hiatt • Jaime Hill • Madyson Hinkel • Jordan Hollander ’16 • +Joan Howarth • Camarie Howell • Isobel Humphrey • In-N-Out • Nicholas and Emily Irwin • Gil Kahn ’16 • Shannon Kallin • Gretchen Kasting • Scott Keefe • Ledya Khamou • Kiss by Monster Mini Golf • Ela Kolano • Kristine Kuzemka • Glenn Lang • David Larsen ’14 • Julia Larson • Las Vegas Aviators • Las Vegas Natural History Museum • Charlotte Leese • Natasha Nerika Lising • Ellsie Lucero ’19 • Marco Luna ’18 • Joshua Malbin • Brittni Martin • Monica Martinez ’17 • Alexandra Mateo • Delia McCarthy • Ryan McConnell • Gloria and Bret Meich ’08 • Madelaine Molaro • Joshua Munce • Nevada Supreme Court Access to Justice Commission • Victoria Nguyen ’13 • Autumn and David Nourse ’17 • Joakim Nyoni • Office of Congresswoman Dina Titus • Curran O’Neill • Michael Oskin • Rebekah Owens • Barbara Patai • Finnian Peck • Michela Peck • Brie Perkins • Brandi Planet ’09 • Alexander Price • Rachel Prosser • David Puryear • Andrew Quinn • Rachel’s Kitchen • Rail Explorers USA • Naomi Rath • Damien Ray

• Carolyn Resnik • Stefanie Resnick ’16 • Pete Reyes ’13 • Alan Rico • Dennis Reid and Cynthia Rivelli • Andrea Roa ’19 • Cody Robison • Jacklyn and Larry Rosen • Sandra Ryan • Joseph Sakai ’14 • Eduardo Samano • Manuela Santos • Claudia and Omar Saucedo ’13 • Christopher Sauser ’18 • Nathaniel Saxe • Beth Seltzer • Brandon Sendall ’13 and Chandeni Sendall ’12 • Christina Servetnick • Settebello Pizzaria • Sarah Shine • Darilyn Slate • Stacey Smith • Gabrielle Sorrell • Raquel Sorrosa ’18 • Victoria Sosa • Springs Preserve • Star Hotel • Mia Stein ’14 • David Stern ’19 • Hiram Henriquez and Amanda Stevens ’15 • Jordan and Casey Stiteler • Lindsey Stratton • Noah Sullivan • Keyonna Summers • Susie Lee for Congress • Lydia Tatchell • Shannon Taylor • Noah Teixeira • Jefferson and Marissa Temple ’04 • Therese Thibeau • Jonell Thomas • Ryan Thomas ’09 • Trader Joe’s • Janet Traut ’01 • Elijah Tredup ’16 • Kyle Trenholm • Claire Trussoni • Julianne Marie Unite ’14 • Bradlee Valandra • Silvia Villanueva ’14 • Karena Viehbacher • Susan Wainscott • Brian Wall • Jaime Walter • Justin Ware • Michael Wendlberger ’07 • Rachel White • Jaclyn Wilke • Lance Williams • Kasi-Nichole Wilson • Nicolas Wooldridge ’03 • Chad Worsley • Marisa Young • Angelina Yount • Andrea Zengion

DEAN’S COUNCIL Michael Bonner, Greenberg Trauig Judge Richard Boulware, U.S. District Court William S. Boyd, Boyd Gaming Joseph Brown, Kolesar &Leatham Ogonna Brown ’01, Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie Sen. Richard Bryan, Fennemore Craig Barbara Buckley, Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada Jennifer Carleton, Howard & Howard Miles Dickson ’11, Nevada GrantLab Timothy Donovan, Caesars Entertainment Corporation

M. Daron Dorsey ’01, Ainsworth Game Technology Robert Eglet, Eglet Adams Speaker Jason Frierson ’01, Clark County District Attorney’s Office Alex Fugazzi, Snell & Wilmer Thomas Gallagher, Thomas and Mary Gallagher Foundation Gerald Gordon, Garman Turner Gordon Brian Irvine ’01, Dickinson Wright Samuel Lionel, Fennemore Craig Judge Gloria Navarro, U.S. District Court Michael Saltman, The Vista Group

Ellen Schulhofer, Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck Jeff Silvestri, McDonald Carano Tom Thomas, Thomas & Mack Company Dan Waite, Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie Melissa Waite ’07, Dickinson Wright Judge Brenda Weksler ’02, U.S. District Court Steve Wolfson, Clark County District Attorney’s Office Kendelee Works ’05, Christiansen Law

M. Daron Dorsey ’01, Ainsworth Game Technology Sandra Douglass Morgan ’03, Kelly Dove ’07, Snell & Wilmer Erin M. Gettel ’15, Federal Public Defender’s Office Charles Gianelloni ’12, Snell & Wilmer Dennis Gutwald ’03, McDonald Carano Keith Hansen ’09, Allegiant Air Marjorie Hauf ’02, Ganz & Hauf Kara B. Hendricks ’01, Greenberg Traurig Jean-Paul Hendricks ’06, Maier Gutierrez & Associates Nicholas Hickly ’12, The Investment Counsel Company Kirk Homeyer ’11, Fertitta Enterprises Brian Irvine ’01, Dickinson Wright Matthew I. Knepper ’12, Knepper & Clark Michael B. Lee ’06, Michael B. Lee, PC Kfir Levy ’03, Mayer Brown Terry A. Moore ’01, Marquis Aurbach Coffing James E. Murphy ’03, Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith

Jessica W. Murphy ’03, Clark County Public Defender’s Office Michael Paretti ’15, Snell & Wilmer Kathia Pereira ’03, Pereira Law Group Casey G. Perkins ’10, EMC Insurance Companies Becky Pintar ’01, Pintar Albiston Robert Potter ’02, Affordable Concepts Rosa Solis-Rainey ’01, Morris Law Group Quinton R. Singleton ’07, Predicate LTD Cassie Stratford Leon Symanski ’01, Craig P. Kenny & Associates Melissa L. Waite ’07, Dickinson Wright Trevor Waite ’14, Alverson Taylor Mortensen & Sanders Ann Ward ’02, Retired Brenda Weksler ’02, US District Court District of Nevada Kendelee L. Works ’05, Christiansen Law Ryan Works ’04, McDonald Carano Lilith Xara, Akerman LLP

ALUMNI LEADERSHIP CIRCLE The Alumni Leadership Circle is a group of dedicated alumni who have pledged a minimum of $5,000 in support of the UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law.

Paola Armeni ’03, Clark Hill Christian Augustin ’15, Claggett & Sykes Brian L. Blaylock ’12, Snell & Wilmer Boyd Gaming Alison Brasier ’07, Richard Harris Personal Injury Law Firm Ogonna Brown ’01, Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie Adam Bult ’04, Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck E. Joe Cain ’01, Fifth Street Gaming Justin L. Carley ’06, The Howard Hughes Corporation Holly E. Cheong ’10, Snell & Wilmer Sean K. Claggett ’03, Claggett & Sykes Zachary B. Conine ’13, State of Nevada Aleem A. Dhalla ’16, Snell & Wilmer Miles Dickson ’11, Nevada GrantLab

BOYD ALUMNI CHAPTER BOARD OF DIRECTORS Gabrielle H. Angle ‘10 Bailey Bort olin ‘15 Katlyn Brady ‘16 Jennifer Carr ‘06 Andrew Coates ‘15 Melissa Corral ‘14 Jessica Gandy ‘16 Erin Gettel ‘15 Monique Jammer ‘18 Amanda Laub ‘18

Brittany M. Llewellyn ‘14 Briana Martinez ‘18 Matt Morris ‘13 Stacy Newman ‘16 Jessica Perlick ’13 Chandler Pohl ‘14; LL.M. ‘18 Francesca M. Resch ‘12 Whitney Short ‘15 Ray Smith ‘03 Amanda Stevens ‘15

Marissa Temple ‘04 Silvia Villanueva ‘14 Brenda Weksler ‘02 Daniel W. Hamilton, Dean and Richard J. Morgan Professor of Law Nakia Jackson-Hale, Executive Director of Alumni Relations and Special Events Lori Johnson, Faculty Liaison Kiley Harrison, Student Liaison Kegan McMullan, Student Liaison 2020 | UNLV Law

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❜

“I hope to have a positive impact in my community.”

BEST VALUE LAW SCHOOL

RANKED #3 AMONG U.S. LAW SCHOOLS FOR PLACING STUDENTS IN STATE CLERKSHIPS

“This program is important to me as a first-generation student.”

“This scholarship has allowed me to focus solely on my legal studies.”

34% OF BOYD LAW SCHOOL’S 1L STUDENTS ARE PEOPLE OF COLOR

THE JUSTICE MICHAEL L. DOUGLAS FELLOWSHIP This program supports first-generation and diverse students interested in law school by providing information and resources they need to be best prepared for law school.

“I’m so grateful for the opportunity to participate in the Douglas program.”

❤ 20% OF BOYD LAW SCHOOL’S 1L STUDENTS IDENTIFY AS LGBTQ

THE RUBY DUNCAN SCHOLARSHIP AND THE JUDGE ADDELIAR GUY SCHOLARSHIP Both of these scholarships promote diversity and inclusion in legal education and the legal profession.

TO MAKE A GIFT Online: law.unlv.edu/givingday Via check (payable to UNLV Foundation - Law): UNLV William S. Boyd School of Law | 4505 S Maryland Pkwy Box 451003 Las Vegas NV 89154-1003